Why I Hate Elena Gilbert on The Vampire Diaries

I have a confession to make: I used to like Elena Gilbert. But that affection has long since died. I’m not sure where it started, but my dislike of her shifted into full-blown hatred last season, when her vampire emotions amplified that nasty little habit she has of making everything about her, all the time. True, the Salvatore brothers have always made everything “all about Elena,” but when SHE makes it “all about Elena,” that’s when I start having a problem with it.

The thing about INTPs is that when we like someone, we purposefully ignore all their faults. Once our trust in them is violated or they go one step too far, that nice, cushion-y barrier of “protective ignorance” comes down, leaving all their faults visible to us in blazing neon lights. Back when I used to like Elena, I took her behavior as externally-focused and excused it as “caring about her friends.” But in retrospect, without my cushion-y barrier up, I’ve come to realize she’s been selfish from the beginning.

My moment of clarity happened when Elena decided to kill off an Original. See, when you kill an Original, everyone in that Original’s line of descendants dies. That means if someone figured out how to kill Klaus, Katherine, Damon, Stefan, and precious Elena would all die. To save one person, because “I can’t lose anyone else,” and to fulfill Jeremy’s hunter’s mark so that SHE could get the cure, Elena killed an Original and by proxy, thousands of vampires—good and evil, without pausing to consider that somewhere out there may have been a girl just like her, in love with a “good” vampire who woke up the next morning to find him dead.

Then, there’s her interaction with her friends. Caroline repeatedly warns her off Damon because she has experience with Damon, who compelled, controlled, and abused her, used her as a human blood bag, and tried to kill her at least twice. But Elena doesn’t want to hear it, because she loves Damon. Once again, it’s all about her. The “true” Elena comes out when she turns her humanity off and tries to kill Caroline – many times, because Caroline irritates her. Then, when her humanity comes back on, Elena doesn’t want to talk about it, because SHE can’t deal with it. Gee, I’m sorry, sweetie… I’m sorry you tried to kill your best friend multiple times and can’t talk about this seriously traumatic experience with the person you really, really hurt, because it pains YOU too much to remember it. It’s your responsibility to suck it up and deal with it, because Caroline matters more than you do right now.

Then there’s Bonnie, who has been dead all summer. Yet somehow, in spite of sending numerous texts and e-mails in which Bonnie never actually physically calls her back, Elena doesn’t concern herself with Bonnie until she needs something from her—for Bonnie to come back and heal Stefan’s amnesia.* Way to be a friend, Elena. Oh, and while you’re at it, why not try and help Stefan get his memory back by acting out all YOUR important moments with him, instead of, you know, taking him around Mystic Falls and talking about all HIS important moments? His family? Friends? Lexi? Because what really matters here is YOU getting Stefan back, because once again, it’s all about you and your compulsive need to have every guy in Mystic Falls worship the ground you love on, and be friends with you even after you crush his heart while you figure out YOUR feelings.

I want the old Elena back, the one who really did care about other people and put their needs first, the one whose willingness to help Damon brought him out of the darkness into the light, the one who didn’t have to make everything about her. That was the Elena I liked, the Elena of the first couple of seasons. The Elena that Elijah looked into and saw the goodness of her heart. Yes, Elena, Elijah. Remember him? The one who did anything and everything he had to, to protect his family, but had the decency to feel remorse in threatening your life to get what he wanted. The Elijah who comforted YOU in one of your darkest moments of non-humanity, who felt genuine grief over the death of YOUR brother, and never said a word about how YOU killed HIS little brother. That Elijah.

Elijah has been my favorite character since he arrived. Gee, I wonder why.

*Spelling it all out really reveals how super-pathetic and soapy this show is. =P

PS: Lest you think I’m harping on Nina Dobrev — I’m not. I think she’s insanely talented and I absolutely love her Katherine Pierce — but Katherine is SUPPOSED to be selfish, since she’s the anti-heroine. Your heroine shouldn’t be just as selfish as your villain if you want people to like her. Oh, and by the way, Stefan, stop acting like a selfish martyr all the time or you’ll be on my hate list, too.

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216 Replies to “Why I Hate Elena Gilbert on The Vampire Diaries”

I have hated her from the get go. She’s a Narcy sour I could really go on.
I despise the thing she is (and not the fact she’s a Vampire)
I hate her to the point I have wanted to go into the screen and tear her godforsakken tongue out. I really don’t have much else to say about her she’s a disgusting disease to her own friends and family around her. Likely my most hated character in TV shows altogether.

I am completely late on this blog but I really do agree with you. I think that out of all the new characters that they introduced to me in the show is not surprising considering that most of them are gonna die anyways. Especially when they try to kill of the main/side characters, it doesn’t break my heart to see them die when death isn’t really a huge problem for them.

But still, I agree with you. Elena really is the golden statue of the whole show but you know what? Since it’s Stefan’s story why don’t we just make it the Delena Diaries instead because it would be better for their show to gain more views than to see how Stefan’s story progresses throughout the series. They treated Stefan like crap being the selfless martyr, sacrificing himself for his family and for Elena, only to have himself back in the heartbreak zone. Yes, Stefan has done some selfish things and his actions are unjustifiable but he still made amends for what he has done. He killed people, yes, but I still think that Stefan is pure in the heart.

Bonnie, being the fix-it tool of the whole group and a powerful Bennett witch, makes me realize that Julie Plec will do anything in her (terrible script-writing) power to show that Bonnie is only the “help.” That really pisses me off because they only need Bonnie for something but, nonetheless, Bonnie is a hypocrite but not as much as a hypocrite as Elena or Damon or anyone else on the series. She had to stand by her “friends” and help save Elena but not once have they tried to save Bonnie the way they save Elena. To me, it screams racism because of how Julie Plec treats her. They expect Bonnie to be their weapon for everything that occurs in Mystic Falls. They expect her to be there for them, to put themselves in front of her first but all I want is Bonnie, Caroline, and Stefan to realize how good they are to be friends with people like them and just say “sayonara!”

Caroline is a hypocrite, she’s judgmental, and she totally downgraded her character development by sleeping with Klaus but honestly, I love Caroline. It’s just how the writers treat her character like how they treat Bonnie and Stefan and the others just got on my nerves. The reason why I love Caroline, despite her having flaws, is that even after she proved the worst of herself, she tries to pick herself back up… that goes for Bonnie and Stefan too.

I never really understood the hype about Elena. I tolerated Elena when I first watched it but I just didn’t understand why people could love her so much when she’s dull and void. She lacks characteristics, a personality that made it indecipherable when comparing Elena to Katherine.

I never really liked Damon and I probably won’t but he has proved himself to me that he does care about his friends in some way, such as sacrificing himself for Bonnie. His actions are still what gets to me. The whole “I’m a murderer and it’s fun” is just disappointing to me because Damon is supposed to show character development (which he has in like the fourth to sixth season) but it just wasn’t really doing it for me. Even in the first season (or second probably), Damon admitted that he wished for Elena to be dead and I don’t understand why you would suddenly turn your words around to wanting to keep her alive? It confuses me.

Anyway, apart from the Elena and Damon shenanigans — since I don’t feel like ranting about their Harley/Joker relationship. I have more problems with the villains in the story.

Silas had been one of the worst characters to ever appear on the show (in my opinion). They should’ve kept “the Originals are the most powerful and oldest beings alive, fear them” plot but they just had to introduce the first immortal 2,000 year old witch or somewhat??? I think that the whole “first immortals” plot should’ve just stayed with the Originals. It just took the whole Original thing out of context (maybe to me) and I just got bored with the whole plot.

The next was Damon. See, I have a lot of problems with Damon and it’s probably because I’m still stuck on the past on what he did to Caroline and Andie (and other various women that he probably raped and abused too). I guess the fact that forgiving Damon for raping someone is being a rape apologist and dismissing it like it’s nothing — now, don’t get me wrong, I know most people love him because of how much growth he’s had in the past years and how attractive he looks but actions say a lot about who you are and Damon just so happens to be someone I would rather have burn in Hell than alive. But anyway, Damon is supposed to be the antagonist of the first season, he wreaks havoc in Mystic Falls but suddenly he turns into this caring but bold guy who wants to save his “girlfriend” from the tomb after trying so hard to find out where she is. I just wanted Damon to be the bad guy for a few more episodes to see how it turned out because it interested me a lot.

The third worst villain is Markos because he is one of the most useless characters in there and I didn’t really pay attention to his own character. So technically, he wasn’t really important in that season.

The fourth worst is Sybil. Now, I didn’t watch the seventh season but from the CW trailers, she didnt stand out to me as someone highly threatening to the others. She’s a rip off of technically every villain that was introduced in TVD.

I feel like I steered my opinions into another path (which Im sorry about but not really??) I guess I just had to get it out there.

I totally agree. The first three seasons of Elena were great. I wish they hadn’t brought her back as a vampire, especially since they made it seem like she had it tougher than Caroline, who was all by herself and was thinking she had turned into a monster and had Damon nearly stake her after pretending to comfort her.

I was just re-watching Season One, I wanted to be reminded of what Caroline was like at the beginning of the show (so glad I did, her character has grown so much since S1!), and have been thinking how interesting it is that, for I think the first time in my TV watching experience, a main character can leave a show and the show is possibly better and stronger for it. I don’t miss Elena at all.
I have also asked myself about 4 billion times, “HOW can Elena, knowing how gleefully Damon has murdered who knows how many innocent people, find him her “soulmate”?” Does she just do what she wants and has the “skill” to block out bad stuff so she can do or have what SHE wants? (yep, probably exactly)
People have been talking about the world (I think they actually mean The United States) being all upside down right. I say well, if you can watch TVD and The Originals and actually say any of those shows’ vampire characters are “good”? Maybe the world is partly upside down because of things like making serial killers the Good Guys. (Sorry, I don’t mean to be sermonizing about it, but i needed to give my cat a break 🙂 she has to hear all of my “rants” haha) Heck, Klaus is The Biggest Bad, but he starts to cry and we all dissolve into pity puddles. Sorry totally veering away from the topic.

I truly miss the ’90s when it comes to female characters in vampire-themed TV. I honestly do not think there has been one to admire since Buffy Summers of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”. She killed her vampire BF to save the world, which is so the opposite of Elena’s behavior. Heck, the female vampire “huntress” (oh fudge, that name makes me cranky too! LOL) in TVD Season 7 is hated and they even called HER a serial killer. But I am glad I am not alone in not liking Elena (which as you said has nothing at all to do with Ms Dobrev, who is awesome. Playing that many parts at once? That impresses me so much!!) I came to Google “I don’t like Elena” after thinking, “Wow, she knows Damon buried Matt’s sister Vicki in the woods! They would never have been able to bury her, to visit her grave… and Elena knew that!”

I had better stop before I annoy everyone else. Or all of our heads simultaneously combust, 😀 But yes I agree and I hope so much that we get more characters more like Buffy. That does not mean moralizing goody-two shoes types. Buffy was thankfully flawed. I want to see strong women who are unselfish and can kick butt too 🙂

Klaus’ actions are unforgivable in my eyes, so you won’t find any Klaus Apologetics on my blog — but I do agree that people (including Elena, as a character) are too quick to dismiss murderous, selfish behavior — in this case, because it’s Romantic.

I admit, I like Damon. I didn’t in the first season, but I think being around Elena made him a better human being — so I don’t mind Delena. What I DO mind is Elena dismissing her friends so easily, when it came down to Caroline’s past vs her feelings for Damon. She could have at least acknowledged the fact that his actions were inexcusable and that Caroline’s opinions are 100% valid. But no. She dismissed them out of hand. SIGH.

Stefan is on my hate list lmao..
1. I know Stefan loves Elena but come on, he can’t make the poor girl take the cure when she made it clear she didn’t want it.
2. Stefan ALWAYS hurts Damon when Elena makes a connection with him.. for ex. Elena drinking Damon’s blood; It’s not like Damon force fed her his blood.
3. And Stefan is so uptight and serious all the goddamn time; It’s like all the fun has been sucked outta him 😉 And it’s literally going to drive me insane.

(I would continue but I mustn’t, hafta get back to TVD 😉

*P.S. I was a Stelena fan but these reasons made me into a delena fan instead and I truly rest with my opinions because Damon and Elena are GOALS even though they aren’t together anymore IRL..*

Okay..
First things first, I totally disagree with the whole raping shit.
Damon NEVER raped Caroline.
Yes he abused her, used her as a blood bank, wanted to kill her but he never raped her.
How did that idea even come about?
Yes, she woke up shocked but that doesn’t say ‘RAPE’.

That’s by the way for Damon.

And Elena……
I dislike her but then pretty much everyone in this series has had a number done on them.

I don’t dislike Elena because she killed Kol to save one person, or because she never apologized to Caroline or because she loved Damon and left Stefan or any of those….

(I actually have the most silly reason to dislike Elena.😀)

I dislike Elena because everyone in the series love her.
Like they can do anything just so she doesn’t die.
Like I just need a break from the whole Elena drama.
And that’s why I’m happy now she’s gone.
But she’s coming back…😩

Well…..
I don’t find anything special about Elena but I love delena.
😂😂.

Since Damon used Compulsion on Caroline (which removes her ability to say no, to act in any way other than how he wants her to act, and to follow his orders), she was incapable of giving full consent to a sexual relationship — under legal terms, that constitutes his treatment of her as rape, the same as the law would regard an intoxicated and/or date-rape-drugged person incapable of giving consent. (The gray area is whether he compelled her at first, or their first encounter and all subsequent encounters were consensual; but if he used ever used Compulsion to ‘put her in the mood’ … it’s rape.)

Gloria, was Caroline being compelled to do everything that Damon said before they had sex? It isn’t about him biting her, which is definitely bad. I think the point being made is that if you take away someone’s decision to make a decision for herself, and do what you want anyway? There is no consent.
Please know this at least for yourself in your life! *hugs*.

We talk about this topic a lot on another show’s message board, and I think it is legit, but I think it also is an error -a big FAT HUGE error- on the part of the writers. They did not think it through like we have, and maybe I am giving them too much leeway here, but I hope I am right. I think they don’t intend for there to be rape. (There was 100% nasty horrible physical abuse, the bites and bruises all over her) *NO ONE is allowed to touch you, especially intimately, without your clear-minded consent. That means if you are drunk, you don’t have a clear mind and CANNOT GIVE consent. So crap yeah if … sorry a tough thing for me, I need to skip ahead, getting nauseated literally.

I just hope VERY MUCH that shows like this and the Twilight and 50 Shades crap doesn’t put women back in a place where we think we only exist to be sex or punching bags for males! It has seemed a lot to me lately with so many nude pix of ladies online, they might say and think they are “owning their sexuality”, but it just makes me sad and think “No! You are saying, to me at least, that your BIGGEST power is your body” <— this is not being a feminist or anything female positive in my understanding and in every fiber of my being.
If you ever look at a message board (or stumble upon one like i did, yuck and someone PLEASE invent "Hey, I can un-see that!" soap! I will buy a ton LOL) where it is just guys talking about whatever, some dude always seems to get around to … um… talking about what he does with that photo. So I don't want to hand some nasty boy with wifi that kind of thing, you know?

A lot of food for thought here, that is always good. Except now I have to find something else to watch.

It’s still rape, nonetheless. Caroline was only seventeen in that episode and Damon was in his mid-20s which meant that it was statutory rape. Even if Caroline did have sex with Damon, he compelled her, used her and sexually abused her to the point where she feared him. It still is rape unless you are eighteen and legal, it wouldn’t be labeled as rape but consensual sex.

I completely agree. I liked the Elena in the first few seasons. After she became a vampire she really went off the deep end. The thing I really disliked was when she wanted to brag about being with Damon in front of Caroline and Bonnie, even though it had only been a short time since she and Stefan broke up and she knew how they felt about Damon. But I’m not in much a position to judge. I haven’t been watching the show in a long time and don’t think I will again.

It’s the writers of the show! I think they keep forgetting she and everyone else is what? 18-19 years old and they keep portraying them as if they are grown ass adults! Take for example when Damon and Elena go to the school to talk about her brother and the teacher tells her relationships in the house can effect his behavior. Im just like come on! She just graduated lol stop acting like she’s some grown adult and her brother is her little baby. It drives me crazy that they have them drinking in bars and acting all grown up! And I agree, it’s getting pretty annoying how EVERYONE is sacrificing everything for this selfish girl! And she’s all of sudden one of the strongest vampires and gets away with defeating all these older vampires? Wtf come on! Someone does need to put her in her place! If she wasn’t in the show and creating all this ridiculous drama (that’s all about her) the show would actually be pretty good. My god those brothers need to kill her themselves and move on! She thinks everything has to be about her!

Ok here’s my gripe about this show not just Elena.
I kinda hate VD (pun intended) more in a love to hate way , but sometimes I truly HATE it. I watch only for the twists and because my ex forced ne too. But ALL the central characters are so hypocritical and ridiculous. Damon is a monster i don’t care if he is “hot”,Elena forgives him for ripping innocent people to shreds because the dull, moping ,sow is” in love with him”… Despite killing her brother or going on a ripper binge with repugnant, loathsome Enzo. Is this enough of a reason, and why do he & Stephan get free passes for killing sprees because they turn off their humanity . Oh thats a great plea for innocence maybe we should all do that & then go kill a bunch of random ppl, all who have friends ,may be in love and unlike the douch brothers havent lived for centuries but like them DIDN’T want to die! Would that plea fly in court do you think? Aha but wait, I’m talking as if Damon would be arrested (who actually confessed to the bewilderingly hypocritical Sheriff Forbes to committing a murder, and she does nothing ,she couldn’t cuff Alaric fast enough when he’d unknowingly killed two people,but the countless headless corpses Damon leaves are perfectly ok?Every time I see that ignorant bitch in a police uniform I wanna slap her!If she had ANY morals she’d quit). Then there’s the short memory span of Matt and others whose family have been killed by Damon, oh yeah and Elena again… He’s far more evil than Kathryn yet believes he’s entitled to revenge on her.
I don’t know what Vampire lore you people know, but I remember when vampires were evil scary monsters and humans killed them as they are undead anyway… The humans were the heroes, whereas in this backwards show the humans are either stupid, or expendable cattle, or presented as uber-villains for trying to wipe out vamps (who are dangerous blood sucking, powerful, parasites… Wes had just cause to make vampires feed on vanpires, taking people out of the food chain) . I know us good looking bad boys are more fun, but you seem to fancy murderers ladies….

I agree with you, but I don’t think it’s a problem with the Elena character- it’s actually the writing of the whole show. I’m watching the first season now on Netflix, and now I remember why I got frustrated and gave up. People are murdered/mind controlled/assaulted/raped by Damon all over the place and Stefan and Elena just act like he’s a puppy that pooped on the couch or something. Other characters are also very blasé about their loved ones dying.

The underlining writing is very sexist. Damon gets away, literally, with everything, whereas the girls are penalized for the same behavior. Elena also slut-shames Caroline for having objections to her dating the guy who mind-wiped, serially abused, and had sex with her under compulsion. Nice job, writers!

I guess the writers just expect everyone who watches the show to not remember it and ignore it. Honestly I watched the show rather slowly(like I would watch 8 episodes rhen not watch for a few months then watch 8 more). So I didn’t realize how odd everyone’s responses were until I started rewatching season 1. Honestly that’s why I prefer the originals cause even though people mercilessly kill people and no one cares at least it makes sense (cause there all supernatural) well besides cam don’t really get what she’s about.

Holy fuckballs, here I was thinking I was the only one who noticed this. For this sort of thing I can’t forgive most of the cast members for turning a blind eye on all the terrible things about half of them have done in the name of ‘love’ and ‘friendship’. Most of them are just terrible people under the self-perpetuated guise that they are not and just trying to do the right thing 😐 The only character who had redeeming qualities to me for the longest time was Caroline, but even she has turned a blind eye to the evils of her friends for too long…

Yeah I’ve been reaching season 1 and I actually like the show somewhat but I think. How everyone acted about Damon was odd and unrealistic. Just curious What do you think about the spinoff the originals. I think it’s better than the vampire diaries mostly cause the majority of the reactions from people are believable and also there’s no weird supernatural love triangle s*** going on. (At least not really)

I never had an interest in TVD because it looked like a replica of the Twilight Series, though this last month, I decided to binge watch the seasons on Netflix, binge The Originals too, and give it all a try.
My first thought was, why are Spike and Angel back from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and then, why is the leading protagonist such a weakling juxtaposed to Buffy?
I really do not mean to be harsh, maybe it’s just age talking, but in watching the show, it’s no secret that the love triangle of Damon, Elena and Stephan was meant to be a large plot device for the series. Who doesn’t love a love triangle! And that’s just it. I really enjoy TVD, but for every other character in the series except those three.
Stephan and his broody guilt and ripper mania are literally a copy cat of Angel from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the similarities astound me. Spike and Damon are also incredibly similar, however at the very least, Spike, who claims to love Buffy, actually chooses to get his soul back and become good for the woman he loves, whereas Damon tells Elena to just accept him for all his murderous glory, and she obeys, which seems counterintuitive to her “good nature.”
Now, Elena is not the worst character on the show, of course not, but she is hypocritical. For Elena, it’s okay to sacrifice and kill whomever in order for those she loves to stay alive. If you’re willing to kill others to spare your loved ones from from being killed, you are a hypocrite, flat out. You’re simply transposing a burden of pain onto someone else. I’m not saying she’s the only one, but it’s silly to not point out the flaws in her logic.
I don’t have respect for Elena. I don’t find her admirable, I don’t have any desire to be like her, I don’t think she’s evil, hell no, but I do think her lack of conviction and overall excuses make her almost lack an identity. I don’t understand how you take a nice girl who was head over heels for someone like Stephan and then throw her into falling in love with a sociopathic narcissist like Damon. It’s kind of illogical.
Now, when the writers had her get with Damon because of the sire bond, that made sense. Hell, even her going through some trauma and turning to the bad boy for a little bit to relieve herself, that makes sense! But if Elena is the “sweet, innocent, selfless and loving” person that everyone claims, I’m sorry, no stable and sane person like that would fall in love with Damon. Or if they did, it would be an unhealthy and toxic relationship, without a doubt.
Caroline? Great sassy girl who has grown tremendously and owns who she is, flawssss and all. Bonnie? Growth, perseverance, has faced loss and struggles too. But Elena, I don’t know, I just don’t see the appeal.
Nina Dobrev is a fantastic actress, I was blown away by her personality shifts, voice intonations, mannerisms, I mean wow, I’ve loved that part of the show! But I have to say, Elena really reminds me of a Bella rather than a Buffy, and so I think it’s silly to proclaim she’s a giant hero on the show. She’s kind of a ‘meh’ character with ‘meh’ growth and just focused on her boyfriends. Like I said, not evil, not horrible, but certainly not a saint of selflessness.
I don’t think she’s the worst character on the show, but I also think it’s silly to glorify her.

The Vampires of Buffy the Vampire are not the same as the vampires of the vampire diaries. Where as the Vampires on Buffy have no soul and Angelous was that until he was cursed with a soul later becoming Angel. The Vampires on the Vampire diaries very much have there souls intact but have heightened emotions and can turn off there humanity whenever they please.

I’ve watched all seasons and not once have I found Elena to be selfish or annoying…I don’t need to state my reasons why because there are so many examples throughout the TVD series. She was the most stable one in the show, except for when she switched her humanity off, and she is the main character. For me it doesn’t make sense why you complain but still watch the show? Honestly I think TVD started rushing their storyline from season 4 onwards and a lot of the characters started losing their depth, in my opinion. And I personally felt Elena should have been one of the few who remained normal and human to add the relatableness to the show. But I am not complaining because I still love TVD and feel that many of the people who complain are whining..and are just whiny people in general. Because strangely every person who has ever told me that Elena is annoying tends to whine on about other things in their lives as well. Frankly I’ve never loved a show and found the main character annoyimg at the same time…whenever that did happen, I just stopprd watching the show overall. I apologise if this comes off offensive because I am not directing this at anyone but that is personally how I feel.

Elena is annoying as hell. And yes effense she needs to stay out of things and stay in her place. Or someone needs to put her in it. And I personally love Damon and Rebecca. I like their personality. But now Damon WHY IS HE LETTING ELENA CONTROL HIM?! I say kill the bitch she is annoying the hell out of me which is why I’m glad she is killed off at the end of season 6 bye annoying selfish bitch :).

I agree Elena isn’t selfish although I really dislike Delena, anyway in the article she says “The “true” Elena comes out when she turns her humanity off and tries to kill Caroline – many times, because Caroline irritates her.” The true Elena? hmm pretty sure someone can’t be their ‘true self’ if they don’t have any emotions. Also something to prove that Elena is not selfish is in Season 6 she was immediately wondering what would happen to Bonnie, proving that she does put her friends before herself unlike Katherine who truly is selfish as she once said “Better you die then I.”

P.S Stelena should get back together because there love was epic and you can tell, every time something happens to Elena you can tell Stefan still loves her and he always will and vice versa.

Elena is a flawed heroine. There is nothing wrong with that, being flawed makes her more real, but by the time she murdered Kol, with no thought as to anyone else, was about the time I hopped off the “I like Elena” bandwagon into MEH.

Lol is all about her just gets to much the day I realize this was when she asked Stefan in season 4 episode 11 what is he doing with Rebbeka who tried to kill her and Stefan replies Damon tried to kill Jeremy twice and you still live him… haha seriously is to much all about her constantly even if every body dies because of her and you still thinks it’s alright???? That is not whining btw is called observation unless you are hyproctic as much as she is

I really don’t understand how some people can dislike Elena. She never makes amends, or apologizes, and she has an aura of self-perfection? Where do you get this crap? Have we been watching the same show? Elena has never once claimed to be perfect. She was very much broken the first season, and slowly she came back to life. Elena has sacrificed herself too but she isn’t in control of what others do, she would’ve died for Bonnie’s mom, she didn’t want that. That was Damon, Elena did not kill her so don’t put that on her. Elena always wanted to sacrifice herself for those she loves. Not to mention she has made amends, she made amends with Jeremy after having his memories taken away, she amended for killing Connor Jordan, I mean she cried and buried the guy, she made amends with Jenna for lying to her about Isobel. To say she never made amends is an exaggeration, she has they just aren’t the ones you wanted to see. But here’s the thing they have a certain quota to fill per episode and sometimes things have to get cut or don’t make it into the script or final cut, that’s the sad reality for any television show.
Back to Elena’s aura of self-perfection, I personally don’t see it. I’ve never seen Elena as a”perfect” character because perfect is unattainable. And she’s owned up to her flaws, you can accept everyone else’s but not her’s? Everyone has flaws but as far as flaws go hers aren’t that bad. So she was indecisive, she was a 17-18 year old girl who had lost a lot, I’m lucky if I can decide what to wear in the morning, you’re being overly critical. And she was selfish because she wanted the cure and that led her to help kill Kol, he tried to kill her brother, it was kill or be killed, should she have invited him in, probably not but they needed to get the map somehow and un-compel Damon from trying to kill Jeremy, it worked for the storyline and besides he came back on the Originals with a new body and a new love, he’s doing okay. But she wasn’t always selfish, and it’s okay to be selfish sometimes, maybe not at the expense at others but she’s a teenage girl, she had her head on her shoulders, she never wanted to be a vampire. Being a vampire changed her as we can all agree. I personally enjoyed her transformation, she was strong and was no longer a damsel in distress. She was powerful.
Anyways the main point I’m going to make is that this is a TV show and you are all hating on a character when you should be hating the writing, they made the character act that way be that way not do whatever it was you wanted them to do. It’s a TV show, and Nina Dobrev is boss. Katherine was badass so it clearly wasn’t her. I personally love Elena and am sad she’s gone from the show but you are all probably ecstatic. To me the show is crap now. Enjoy watching you got what you wanted.

First of all… I would like to emphasize that she did not just kill kol… She mentioned in her plan that she killed thousands of innocent vampires who may be better than Stefan or Lexi… Secondly SHE NEEDED A WAY TO UNCOMPEL DAMON…. He wasn’t being hurt in the cellar just weakened… Plus if you keep track thousands is still a lot more than Damon or Jeremy’s or Elena’s life…

Honestly I think they make Elena like a god (if you believe in gods i don’t judge). It’s like she can do whatever she wants and there’s no consequences. It’s like basic rules of morality don’t apply to her because she’s Elena. I can be selfish, I have flaws like every one else and it’s good than she has but she has to face the reality that stuffs gonna happen and she has to grow up and deal with it

Caroline, Bonnie, Tyler there so many people who’ve been through way worse than her and she can’t even suck it up and apologise to Caroline like a real friend and she lets Bonnie’s grams die helping her and then wonder why Bonnie’s mad.

And it’s like everyone was put their to make life easier for Elena. Like when Jeremy’s mad at her for erasing his memories and the Salvatore’s go all good cop bad cop on him.

The writers just have to throw her off her high horse before someone shoots her off it. She’s selfish, self serving and worse than Katherine. Katherine at least isn’t a fake she doesn’t pretend to be all righteous and great.

i agree. When i was watching the show, i had kept wishing for the antagonists ( kol, rebekah, elijah, klaus, etc) to win. their purposes weren’t even that bad. the just wanted to stop elena and the others to doing something that could ruin everything for them. sure their methods were not appropriate, but it didn’t mean they were bad. . . and the others were all circled around one person, elena. in the first season bonnie did everything in her power to help elena because they were friends. and in other seasons caroline dedicated basically her whole life to helping elena with all her problems. bonnie and caroline both really care for her! i had wish stefen just gave up on her. like, didnt love her anymore. but he just kept on trying. the was alot of pity for the mikaelson family. honestly, i just want to stop watching. . . . . .. . which i probaly will. ugh, elena and her b*tchy needs.

LOL Um… you do know that writers invent the character, right? Since she is a fictional character, she was invented (well of course she started as a character in a book, but the books are SO completely different from the show). by writers.
I’m sorry, I just don’t understand what you mean. And no one is perfect, if we humans were, we would be boring. I frankly like flawed humans who know they are flawed and make attempts at doing better. But Elena doesn’t exist without writers.
I wrote about Buffy earlier – she is a great example of a flawed human, especially in her portrayer’s (Sarah Michelle Gellar) least fave season, season 6, when Buffy does things that she (and about half of the audience at the time) felt were completely out of character.
Now I see that she had about a million horrible things happen to her, and she (still writing about Buffy) was doing her version of “self-medicating”.And 90% of the time, maybe more? Self medicating is pretty harmful. But she still wasn’t off helping the guy who was part of it kill people. The thing that I don’t get is why human life does not matter to Elena. What seems to matter most to her is having a boyfriend.

And I just realized that she could arguably have been self-medicating too since she had suffered the loss of her parents and then more really bad stuff. But doing it for that long? Eyikes! (This is an awesome blog, I like it when we get to actually think and discuss!)

Just found your blog entry and I totally agree with everything! When I started watching The Vampire Diaries I liked Elena. I really did. I felt pity for her when she got dragged into the whole mess of vampires, werevolves, witches and hybrids and hoped for a bit of happiness in her life, but as soon as she turned into a vampire I started to hate her. I really hate it how she schemed a plan to kill Kol and never waisted any second thought of who and how many she was actually killing with that, just because she can save ONE SINGLE person. I do understand that Jeremy’s family and Elena prioritise him over everyone else (who wouldn’t), but this was just contrary to the Elena we knew before, who wouldn’t want so sacrifise anyone for anything (or tried to keep the collateral damage to a minimum at least idk.). My point is: I was really disappointed with her character development and I’m stuck at the end of season 4 at the moment and just hope it will get better, but according to some comments here it won’t. Geez.
Lots of my friends worship Elena and always disagreed with me, when I tried to explain why I don’t like her, so I was kinda relieved to see how many share my thoughts.

I don’t know if you’ve continued watching since you posted this, but I can tell you (and this is just my own opinion and I’ve watched the entire series 4 times over now) that I agree with everything the original post said, but it gets better. Not just because Elena stops being annoying (because she kind of doesn’t) but because the writers start to develop the stories of the other characters at the same time and it brings a really good balance. Season 6 was my all time favorite and I rewatch it all the time. So hang in there, you’ll be glad you did.

I like Elena, but I’m not gonna argue with you or anything, you have your opinion, I have mine, but, trust me, see season 6 it’s NOTHING about Elena (just the last episode, but it’s because Nina Dobrev left) Elena comes back to be the selfless Elena, you can see that by the way she sacrifices herself at the end for Bonnie

Ican understand wwhat you mean but i have to disagree on the sacrifice part ! I mean C’mon that was a horrible ending! Bonnie has to hold this guilt for the rest of her life knowing that she is the reason that elena is lying in a coffin!

Actually i hate her too. When Caroline’s dad died, And Alarick was killed by someone in Elena’s house ( same night ) Elena get all the attention. ” I can’t lose again someone” yes but Who cares about Caroline? Or Alarick… And actually when Elena and Caroline were on the stairs in Caroline’s house it was strange. Yes, Elena hugged her.. But.. She was like “Yea i know is hard, just get over it, i’m here with u just to listen u.” And when Esther tried to kill her family BonNie’s mother died because of Elena.
PS. Sorry for my bad English. 🙂

Right from the beginning, I wasn’t a big Elena fan. The end of season 1 and the beginning of season 2 really sparked the dislike I have of her. I mean, season 2 episode 3, when she kept doing that “hate thing” with Damon, she kept making herself so hard to get. That if someone wants to be her friend, they have to try so hard and then SHE gets to decide whether they can be friends or not because it’s all about her. She can insult Damon or Caroline all she wants, but if they say something back to her, she gets so offended and then she goes to Steffen because it has to be all about her! She’s an annoying hypocrite that expects everyone to like her because Steffen has made it all about her. It’s like she thinks if she says someone can’t do something, they won’t because she says they can’t, and uses her friendship with that person to control them. She thinks that just because she says something to someone, they’ll do it. She uses herself against them and expects them to keep trying to be her friend. And it makes me so angry. That just because it’s her, they’ll protect her.
And then that poor thing with Caroline! For starters, when Caroline was trying to get in a relationship with Matt, Elena kept telling the stories of how she and Matt started to like each other. Even though it was clearly bothering Caroline, she kept doing it. Just had to keep talking about all the amazing memories she and Matt made. Despite the fact that Caroline really, really liked Matt and wanted to make her OWN memories with him. And then Elena tries to kill Caroline in the later seasons! Even though it’s certainly traumatizing for Caroline that one of her best friends tries to kill her, poor Elena doesn’t want to talk about it because it bothers her to face what she’s done. So Caroline gets to wallow in the trauma by herself because Elena is stupid. She’s stupid.
I totally agree with you.

I don’t like Elena anymore either.
I am only currently on season 4 so I didn’t read all the comments because I didn’t want to read any spoilers for the next seasons but really this girl is such a biatch.. excuse me for my words..
She’s acting like she doesn’t care at all about Stefan anymore. She doesn’t care about his feelings all she wants is be with Damon.. Damon is good for her he’s been always protecting her and loving her and everything but come onnnnn how can she forget so easily what she’s been through with Stefan? Suddenly he’s not her soulmate anymore? It’s ridiculous how she acts all of a sudden and that’s unfair to Stefan.
It’s better if Elena dies and everyone move on with their lives because this girl always gets to get whatever she wants and it’s so unfair.
And yeah she is selfish. The whole “Vampire diaries world” is doing everything about her and caring for her and trying to do all what is better for her but she totally forgets who’s been there for her all this time so easily?
Then Katherine was better. At least she never pretended she had a good heart and you knew from the beginning how she was,Elena always acted like she had a heart and feelings but all she cares about is herself. When she said something like ” It’s not because I’m sired to Damon it is because I am in love with him” I totally hated her. She could have feelings for Damon since he’s been so good to her don’t get me wrong,but suddenly she doesn’t even give a damn to how much she’s hurting Stefan that’s been all his life trying to be a better person for HER?!

I stumbled upon The Vampire Diaries through Claire Holt(Rebekah). I skipped the first couple of seasons since I wanted to get to see her. Right off, I noticed Elena. Everyone was always busy trying to save her, make her mortal again. But then, here was Rebekah, who wanted to be mortal than anything. She disliked the vampire life and longed to become human. She gave that up to save April and to prove she can be a good person.

I also noticed that Elena did little in the quest to find a cure. I don’t remember exactly if she did anything or not, but I noticed it was the people around her that were trying to find the cure.

Rebekah has many things in her life that she wants to change. The fact that she even WANTED to try and become better says a lot. Also, Caroline and Bonnie are in a whirlwind of drama. They find a little bit of happiness, but it changes drastically to fit Elena’s needs. That part really pissed me off.

Honestly, not many people like Rebekah. She’s hot tempered and likes to have her way. In the end though, she does help. What pissed me off the most was that she started to become friends with Elena. I am all for the burying the hatchet thing, but really!? Elena created a lot of havoc in her life. She killed her brother (although Rebekah was sort of happy about that, but still. her brother), and most of Elena’s circle of comfort dislikes her. And then she goes off and forgives Elena? Granted, they are more on the terms of frenemies, but this shows how the writers strive so hard to make Elena the center of attention.

Also, did anyone hear that Nina isn’t going to come back as Elena? Anyone celebrating?

To the killing vampires thing, all I can ask is “So?” They’re vampires, not humans. They’re existence isn’t natural anyway. Either way, Elena has the right to protect the people she loves. You make a ridiculous grand statement like “What if there’s someone out there?” as if this way of thinking is any different from the entire series. The problem here isn’t with Elena, it’s with you. Elena has never altered her perception on things. She’s always put the people she loves above anyone else. You apparently never realized it because you never paid attention to the show.

Elena was under the sire bond at that time. Her mind was clouded. But’s it’s not like Caroline, the hypocrite, has any room to talk, seeing as how she banged the hybrid who literally murdered half of Elena’s family.Tried to kill her, three times, killed Tyler, turning him into a hybrid, murdered Tyler’s mother, tried to kill Bonnie, kidnapped her, and by this point in the show that you posted this at had decided that it was okay being friends with that hybrid. And Caroline had the absolute audacity trying to say this crap to Elena.

To say that anyone without their emotions is the true version of them is just complete ignorance. Emotions are a vital part of your personality. You make decisions without them that you’d never make with them.

Elena only has her memories with Stefan. He barely shared anything about his past with her unless he had to. And she barely knew Lexi.

You were doing just fine with your argument until you made it a personal attack against me, instead of sticking to the facts. It weakens your stance when you do that.

Also, you need to be careful in making statements like “they’re just vampires… their existence is unnatural anyway,” since that’s a very familiar argument. The Nazis used to use it: oh, they’re just Jews. Who cares? They may be vampires, but they they still can feel pain, and have a soul, and the ability to love … so killing them is still killing someone.

Elena has always been selfishly protective of the people she cares about … and she likes to use her friends to get what she wants. There’s nothing wrong with protecting the people you love. What I do have a problem with is selfishness, and she has it in spades.

Fortunately, I no longer watch the show … so I don’t spend much time thinking about Elena anymore.

Aw, boo. And wow. You just compared me to the Nazi’s. Ain’t that classy. We’re talking about fictional characters. Get a grip. Don’t blame me because you didn’t pay attention to the show. Vampires are monsters. All of them are. If this show has shown us anything, it’s that.

How dare she be selfish. It’s not like that’s big character trait people have. No, wait. That’s exactly how people are. How almost every character on this show is. Especially your precious wittle snowflake queen Caroline..

No, it wasn’t. Stefan was selfless throughout the first several seasons. Bonnie could be kind of a brat — and then she would turn around and save her friends, time and again, whenever they needed her to, despite hating what they were doing. Caroline was petty, neurotic, and insecure… but went out of her way to befriend Tyler and help him through a tough time just because he had no one.

Elena has been selfish from the start, but … for the most part, the people around her weren’t. Even Damon had selfless moments, where he did something so Stefan WOULDN’T do it — and earn Elena’s wrath.

Ultimately, Elena became too horrific for me to continue watching the show — even though I continued to like Stefan, Caroline, and Bonnie. When she put Caroline through so much, and then refused to apologize or even talk about it, because her own feelings were worth more than those of her friends? I was so done.

I think the point she was trying to make (well or not) was that generalizations don’t work. You seem to be pro-Elena and I assume you don’t want her to die and you value her life.

If all vampires are monsters whose lives are not valid and we should not care what happens to them, then by that same logic Elena’s life does not matter nor should we care if she lives or dies (if anything, we should be rooting for her demise). You can’t make a generalized statement saying that “all vampires are monsters (even ones like Lexi who have proven themselves the opposite through their actions)” but then turn around and say “except Elena Gilbert whose life is more valuable.” That is what your statement and argument sounds like. Also, it’s a mentality like that that makes fans dislike Elena in the first place, the narrative treating her like she’s special and her life has more value than anyone else’s.

While selfishness is a common trait (and I LIKE selfish characters who are unapologetic about it), the problem with Elena is how she’s written and how the narrative treats her. Ever heard of the trope “Character Shilling”? TV Tropes explains it better but the gist is that when a character’s supposed positive characteristics (like, say, “compassion”) are talked up by EVERYONE including people who have just met her (like Elijah) when they haven’t done anything special to warrant that praise. This is a problem because: A) it’s bad writing and shows that the author/writers are insecure about their character and their actions that they need to have someone cool or “an authority” comment on how great the heroine is without showing her DOING the talked up characteristic; and B) more often than not, most talked up characters (in the positive, want to make them into role models way) don’t live up to the hype of how “nice” or “compassionate” they are and SHOW that they might just be the opposite. Basically, we’re TOLD by the writers “this is a really nice, compassionate girl who you really must like because she is the ideal we all must strive for” but then we’re SHOWN a girl who is just somewhat decent (if that), indecisive, and self-centered girl. Audience members don’t tend like shilled characters (as shown by the very vilified Lana Lang) who get spoiled by the narrative.

That’s the big problem with Elena’s selfishness. We’re told by everyone that she’s “selfless” through characters and narrative and then we’re SHOWN that she’s selfish. Of course there’s going to be a backlash.

Elena did become completely selfish. I don’t blame her when her humanity was off but she never even apologised after. Killing kol not the problem the fact that she didn’t even blink didn’t think twice about it. She was a vampire at the time and everyone she loved but matt and Bonnie was also she knows the possibilities. Many good vampires like Stefan lexi Bonnie’s mom even Damon sometimes. Stefan just reminded her of this when she tried to kill rebecca she is very selfish I feel it was Damon’s influence she was not like that with stefan

No vampire is good, that the show has shown. There are vampires that have done good things. Bur not good vampires. Lexi was better than most and her and Rose were some of the better ones on the series. But even Lexi was a human abusing, mind raping, people draining monster. Not an active murderer, true enough. But not good. I reject the idea that someone should apologize for something they aren’t responsible for. Elena has shown in the past to make the same decisions, like telling Damon that he could kill the werewolves, but not Tyler. Have a very great day!

First off, before I begin, I just want to clarify that I don’t care who Elena winds up with. I am completely indifferent towards her and the brothers. So I have no Delena vs. Stelena bias.

1) For months during season 1, Damon compelled Caroline into being his blood bag, minion, and sex-toy. He raped her while she was trapped into her own mind and couldn’t do anything to stop it. Before anyone says “it’s not rape, she went after him the first time,” YES, THE FIRST TIME! After that, he COMPELLED her (taking away someone’s ability to consent makes it rape, that’s why roofing someone’s drink and then having sex with them is in fact rape). Anyone who says that Caroline deserved it for wanting to have sex with a stranger, dude, you’re a sexist pig. There’s nothing wrong with having a one-night-stand as a pick-me-up. Men do it all the time and there’s nothing wrong with that so long as everyone is responsible about protection. I’m a firm believer in equality, if something a man does is socially acceptable then it also is for a woman to do it. In spite of maybe only knowing for sure about the first two, it wouldn’t take a genius to suspect that Damon also raped her considering Caroline’s reactions. Elena never once confronted Damon, not even in season 1, about what he did to Caroline.

2) Elena was making friends with Damon by mid-season 1. Meaning that she decided all on her own to forgive Damon for what he did to Caroline (a childhood friend). By the time Caroline transitioned, she was FORCED to be civil with her own rapist who was getting away scot free with what he’d done. All with Stefan and Elena’s blessing.

3) When Caroline confronted Elena about the Damon thing, she was already starting to suspect about the sire-bond. Was this the best way to steer her friend away from a guy with a rape precedent? No. Caroline is not perfect. She’s not meant to be perfect. We like her for her flaws and her strengths. Communicating with her friends without putting her foot in her mouth is one of her flaws. It also turns out that talking about her rapist makes her temperamental and bitchy (wow, what a HORRIBLE crime *note the sarcasm*). Let me put it this way: The sire-bond is all about making the sire vampire the master. Meaning that if Damon said “let’s have sex,” Elena might not be fully able to say no because the sire-bond makes her want to please him. Sound familiar? How do you think this looked like to Caroline, someone who DID have her will taken away so Damon could use her as a blood bag, minion, and sex-toy? Of course her first reaction is going to be to assume the worst of Damon, he the guy who raped her, nothing is going to make Caroline forget that so easily. Would you want your friend to be with the guy who raped you? I would assume no.

4) Keep in mind that Caroline was always actively fighting against herself for liking Klaus precisely because she didn’t want to be disloyal. By the time she starts warming up to him, Elena has turned her humanity off and made an attempt on her mom’s life (not to mention her own). I’m sorry, but, humanity or not, I would cut someone out of my life (if I didn’t kill them myself) if they tried something against my mom. I don’t know about you, but my mom (and my dad) is the one thing you don’t screw around with. (Good) Parents are sacred. You don’t touch. Caroline still forgave her for that (in spite of going after the ONE PERSON CARE LOVES MOST IN THE WORLD), showing a surprising amount of compassion. Same for Bonnie. They didn’t have to, they were under ZERO obligation to forgive her, but they did. Again, they used the argument of “she was not herself” and accepted it. OK, for the purpose of this story I can accept it. That’s not the part of the story that bugs me. What has me frothing at the mouth is that Elena claimed that she WOULD NOT APOLOGIZE as it would be too painful for HER to think about what she did.

…

When Bonnie made that whole mess with Silas and Expression magic, she was remorseful and tried to apologize in her own way by sacrificing herself for her friends and the world (didn’t work but, eh, thought that counts). When Stefan came off his Ripper high, he tried to make amends. Elena didn’t make ANY effort and she was EFFORTLESSLY forgiven. It’s not what they did during their humanity-less moments that is important to the character, it’s what they do afterwards that counts.

At that point, there’s no point in caring anymore about what would hurt Elena or not because Elena didn’t care that she nearly killed Caroline’s mom enough to apologize.

5) See number 2. What goes around, comes around. And Caroline never made any of her friends hang out with Klaus and accept him as a caveat to her friendship, so she’s still being even more courteous than Elena.

6) Damon is just as bad, worse even than Klaus. Remember that pretentious speech he gave about “doing evil with a purpose”? Am I the only one who laughed at him? Name how many things Damon did during season 1 that was “with a purpose”. Killing Lexi? He could have used any vamp or even Vicky’s corpse as the vamp to frame. He killed Lexi FOR NO REASON other than to break Stefan’s heart. Turning Vicky? NO REASON AT ALL. He didn’t even take responsibility over his newly fledged childe, causing Vicky’s untimely death. Using Caroline as a sex-slave AND tormenting her AND blackmailing her with her mom’s, Bonnie’s, and Elena’s deaths? THERE WAS NO REASON FOR THAT, HE WAS COMPELLING HER ANYWAY AND HE WAS JUST A MONSTER FOR NO REASON. All he had to do was use her to get the necklace, that’s it. Bluffing to compelling Vicky to tell the town about vampires when he wanted to free the tomb just to make Stefan sweat? NO REASON! Meanwhile, the majority of Klaus’ actions DID have a purpose: killing Elena, Jules, and Jenna? Break the curse to be stronger than Mikael. The hybrids and humans compelled to make spectacle in MF? Smoke and mirrors for Mikael. The hybrids? Aside from the obvious emotional need, he also needed a strong army against Mikael plus anyone else (his paranoia was well-earned). Killing Rebekah’s lovers? You know, if my sister’s first husband had daggered me and my sibs while we were sleeping, then gave me a curse for 50 years when I killed him, and later learned he was sent by Mikael to infiltrate us and get us paralyzed for him, I’d be paranoid about my sister’s lovers too. Considering that if Alexander had been equipped with a White Oak stake instead of the daggers, the entire Original family would have died instead of been in a comma (minus Klaus). A lot of Klaus’ action stem from genuine paranoia. Which, ok, if someone tried to actively kill you for 1000 years, it’s not really paranoia so much as being prepared for the worst. Damon is just the schoolyard bully who was never put in his place with too much power in his hands.

7) The lives of thousands, maybe even millions if Kol’s childe were big on turning, does matter. What, are you saying that because we didn’t SEE any vamp all of a sudden keel over dead and graying, their deaths don’t matter? Would you still feel the same if, in an alternate universe where Lexi couldn’t go to MF in season 1, during a Bon Jovi “hope you feel better about Elena pulling a Katherine” party with Stefan, Lexi dropped mid-dance-step, graying with the veins popping out and her eyes gazing lifelessly at the ceiling because she’s of Kol’s line? What about Lee, her lover? Maybe they were in the middle of a make-out session and they both died? How about then, Mr. Vampire Lives Don’t Matter, They’re Monsters Anyway?

Also, you do realize that in that ideology, Elena’s life doesn’t matter anymore on account of her being a filthy little vampire now. Either Elena’s life matters and so do those of other vampires or she’s now a vampire and she’s better off as dead as those in Kol’s line. You can’t have it both ways. That’s part of the reason so many people don’t like Elena, because the narrative spoils her and spares her from facing the consequences of her own actions.

8) Kol DID try to warn them the traditional “YOU IDIOTS ARE GOING TO JUMPSTART THE APOCALYPSE!” Then he realized he was waisting his breath when they all claimed the cure was more important because Elena needed to choose between a Salvatore brother of her own freewill. Yeah, I’d get impatient and just compel one of those morons to kill the hunter too. And he was right, at the end. They did jumpstart an afterlife apocalypse. Too bad Damon didn’t genuinely die from Vaughn’s bullet, maybe THAT would have driven the point home that Elena’s personal feelings ARE NOT MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE REST OF THE WORLD BEING SUPERNATURAL ZOMBIE FREE. No really, Kol took the role of Spike in season 2 finale of Buffy: vampire Big Bad hedonist, yes. Moron who decides destroying the world is a good idea, hell no and he’s stopping people from doing that. Only difference is that Spike went to Buffy (who DID care that the world would continue to turn around the Sun tomorrow), Kol instead tried to dissuade Damon and Elena instead of the real reasonable people of the group. Considering that Kol’s warnings came true, this made his death tragic rather than karmic. Meanwhile, Jeremy’s death due to the group’s arrogance that they could get away with the cure unscathed, that came off as karmic considering that he was one of the people involved in jumpstarting the apocalypse. Also, we ALL knew that Jeremy would eventually be brought back to life because there’s a huge precedent set for that, so as an audience the death didn’t hit us in the gut like it would from a character who doesn’t have a precedent for being brought back to life.

What? So, it’s okay to do something bad if someone does something bad to you? That’s complete nonsense. And it’s also acceptable somehow for people that other characters love as payback? Again, that’s just straight up nonsense.

Nothing Elena does justifies anything Caroline does.

Again, vampires. I’m sure I would’ve felt bad. Because I connected with them as characters. But that’s not what happened. I said this on youtube after season 3 ended and I’ll say it again: I would have accepted season 3 as the final season if they had taken out all the originals, even though it would’ve taken out almost all the main characters. No more vampires. I was actually rooting for Esther quite a bit in the second half of that season. And they’ve shown on the show that Lexi has abused humans in her own as well. She’s not innocent.

I’m also going to say something: Damon didn’t rape Caroline. At no point in that arc did Damon compel her for sex or force her to have sex with him against her will. For all intents and purposes, it appeared to be consensual. He could’ve compelled her for sex. It’s not impossible. But we never saw it. The way they’ve stated that compulsion on the show is that if you want someone to do everything you say or want, you compel them to do everything you say or want. That is not what happened with Damon and Caroline. Damon compelled on occasions, but never gave her a blanket compulsion. As shown on two separate occasions in Friday Night Bites and Family Ties, where he compels Caroline to take him to the party and to help Elena and Bonnie. Again, he could’ve. But we’re never shown this. He certainly abused her. But, ya know, vampires.

On Damon and rape. They might not have shown it directly but it was certainly implied. Caroline wakes up, naked, in her bed next to Damon and she’s terrified out of her wits. She tries to tiptoe out of the way so he won’t notice she’s gone and then he grabs her and bites her. The implication in this scene is that she woke up after being raped and then was fed on (maybe to be raped again). It was a case of “does this remind you of anything”? A girl wakes up naked next to a man and she’s terrified kind of implies that she was date-raped. And even if she wasn’t, Damon still abused her. And last I checked, Elena was 100% human (minus the doppleganger thing) when she befriended Damon in mid-season 1 not even five episodes after all the horror he put Caroline through.

Also, the apocalypse didn’t happen as we know it because Bonnie closed the Other Side portal, sacrificing herself. If she hadn’t, what do you think would have happened in a world where the supernatural dead walked and COULDN’T BE KILLED AGAIN? Sure, some like Vicky would have lived her life as usual, but do you really think some of them wouldn’t have decided “Hey, we don’t need to feed anymore, WHY do we need humans now?” Or maybe it would have caused a never-ending war between vampires, werewolves, and witches WHO CAN NEVER DIE. Hell, population control would be shot to hell thanks to supernaturals dying but then coming back to life (even if it’s just witches and werwolves, they would still overpopulate the human population and maybe even kill them off for space). Even if you don’t have the imagination to think of the worst case scenario where supernaturals come back to life and can never die again, it still followed in the heels of the Travelers since Silas waking up was a beacon to them. Remember, the Travelers were a bunch of supremacists that wanted witches and vampires dead because their magic “wasn’t pure”. Sure, it would start with witches and vampires, but how long until they pulled that same rhetoric on humans and werwolves for not having magic at all? Not long, considering the kind of mentality supremacists like Markos have. In other words, the MF gang jumpstarted a lot of calamities for a cure that none of the nominal heroes used.

Also, on if it’s all right to do something bad to someone back. Let me put it this way. Friendships are not simple (unless they’re the superficial sort). What matters in a friendship is if the person is the one who would protect you from harm and be there with a shovel and an alibi ready if you do something stupid. Basically, they’re there for you at your worst. Bonnie and Caroline have both been there for Elena and didn’t turn their backs on her after her stint as humanity-less and forgave her without her doing anything to earn forgiveness. Elena has taken them both for granted multiple times. When a friend takes your friendship for granted many times and even hurts you constantly, there’s two healthy options you can take: 1) cut them out of your life or 2) remain their friend but prioritize your own wants and needs rather than your friend’s. Otherwise, if a friendship is based on one person just giving, giving, and giving without reciprocity, then that’s very unhealthy friendship. Just like Elena decided (probably not in a malicious way) to befriend Damon, Caroline took priority her own happiness and became closer to Klaus rather than let her world revolve around “what would Elena approve of?”.

Like I said, Caroline is not a special snowflake and she has many flaws (she’s judgmental, she’s insensitive, she’s blunt, she’s at time hypocritical, she’s controlling and neurotic…), but that’s why we like her. She’s a rounded character. We SEE and are SHOWN Caroline’s positive AND negative characteristics. Same for Bonnie. Bonnie is also not a special snowflake, but she is a full rounded character with her own wants and needs that have nothing to with others. Caroline and Bonnie can both be raging bitches and then turn around and sacrifice their own well-being for their in-group. What we care about is that their relationship with Elena might be unbalances with them giving so much to Elena without receiving the same.

Oh! Also, Kol was wrong. There was no apocalypse at all. What’s hilarious to me is that Kol gives that big ridiculous speech in the season four finale about how the so-called heroes of Mystic Falls when none of the characters ever really claim to be heroes. Like, that made me think that Kol was high or something.

You need to consider the fact that even if Elena thought vampires were all just horrible monsters why would she be friends with Caroline, Stefan and Damon? She saw vampires as people. So killing a whole lineage of people should not be consider a selfless act or be justified by the fact she was helping here friends.

That tells me that Elena sees them as people because she cares about them. They’re all still vampires. Elena did the same thing in season 2 when she told Damon that he could kill the werewolves, but not Tyler. Have a very great day!

You know that Bonnie’s mother died because of Elena right? After Caroline’s dad died. Did she go to her house and do something? No. She was expecting Matt to call her. For me this isn’t a good person.
PS. Sorry for bad English.

I know right! The human Elena cared about everyone! She cared if they got hurt, she cared whatever happened to anyone! Even when Elena was first a vampire, I loved her! But after the humanity switch, I could not tell the difference between her and Katherine. Honestly, wait, no, Katherine was BETTER than Elena with no humanity! Plus, at least Katherine had the decency to love Stefan AND Damon (or at least show it that way, I believe she loved Stefan tho…) and not break one of their Hearts. Katherine is my favorite character. I’m not hating on Elena… She’s cool and all… But she aggravates me. Nina dobrev, however, is insanely unbelievably beautiful and talented. I love you nina dobrev and Katherine pierce!

Very interesting ideas! I do agree with a lot of it. I always struggle with how to feel about Elena. To be honest, I have disliked every single character on this show at least once. They’ve all lost so much, so I think what I’ve tried to do is simply put myself into their shoes and honestly consider if I would be acting any better than them. Sometimes it works, but often Elena really gets on my nerves.
I have always thought that the biggest mistake that this show made was introducing the sire bond to Damon and Elena’s relationship. They should have just gotten together, had some angst and struggle, but not overdone it. The sire bond was simply introduced in order to keep shipping wars going, and to give Stelena fans hope/an argument against the Delena relationship. I think he best thing that they can do is have Elena stick with her choice. There was that time in season 5 when Stefan lost his memory, that was truly annoying. Elena reminding him all about their past relationship, and not telling him that she’s with Damon until the last moment, bugged me.
She just needs to stick with Damon, become a less selfish character, kick some ass in order to get Bonnie back, and that would be a positive direction for her character. Season 6 has been actually pretty promising to me, much better than seasons 4 and 5. The Bamon dynamic is fun to watch, and Bonnie needs a good friend like Damon. Also, the Defan love has been awesome. Damon coming back to life and seeing Stefan first was perfect. Stefan fixing Damon’s car while he was dead also kind-of-almost redeemed him for being so unlikeable in the beginning of the season lol.

I feel the exact same way. I love Nina Dobrev so I really want to love Elena but Elena gets on my nerves sometimes! I started to dislike Elena when she became a vampire. I also do not understand the point of the sire bond whether I’m a fan of SE or DE. If they want Damon and Elena to be together then just do it already! Although I was attracted to the show because of the relationship between Stefan and Elena (and still secretly hope they end up together) they never should have gotten together in the first place if the writers wanted Damon to be her end love. I hate that this show has just divided fans between such a silly love triangle! The idea that Elena has dated/slept with 2 brothers is GROSS on all levels. They should have just prolonged DE as long as possible till like the end of the show. And now they don’t know what to do with them and instead introduce stupid things like the sire bond. I think now even DE fans would agree that the writers have just messed up their relationship. Another thing that upsets me is that they continue to undermine the relationship that Stefan and Elena had. Its like they’re trying so hard to pretend like it never existed!!! Which isn’t fair to anyone!
And I agree that she either needs to just stick with Damon or just move on and not date any of the brothers. Her love life is getting ridiculous. Can’t these characters just be single for once! But season 6 is looking a lot better with Kai as the new villain. Season 4 and 5 were not good.. (when DE got together..hmmm..) I wish they would show more Defan moments.. that is the TRUE LOVE of this show.

I have been tortured by these characters. They consume my thoughts because I am watching the seasons on Netflix one right after the other. Never have characters affected me like this. I started watching because of the pure love Stefan and Elena had for each other. I don’t know if it was great acting or just my own desire for it to be true but they had such a strong bond. The bottom line is that I am completely ridiculous to even put this much thought and feeling into a fictional tv show? What is wrong with me.

elena should stay with stefan. the serie should portray that even after all the difficulties that elena and stefan went through, they were 2gether at last bse it waz them who first appeared on set, but not damon and elena. i go with stelena coz its what iz best.

So you want Elena back in Stefan’s life after she’s been messing around with his brother for several years? Isn’t that like sloppy seconds? Doesn’t Stefan deserve better than a two-timer who has been sleeping with his brother?

I agreee first season loved it 2 season i started noticing the fight over elana 3rd season elana ..and elana this show is called vampire diaries and way before elana became a vampire this show has been all about her and why is everyone on this show trashy except bonnie…everyone is going out with eachothers ex or brothers like its a cycle with these characters ps.sorry if i mispelled anything.

They make everything bout her, because she’s the main character but it is over the top, but at least she cared about others in season 1 and was compassionate. I know right Bonnie is the only sane, normal one with class!

Never really liked her. She has always been a pain in the ass. Time to take the show off air. I t socks and the writers messed up royally. Buffy the Vampire Slayer did it better between Angel and Spike. And whatever happened to the dairies hence the shows name.

Nice article! I was so happy to stumble across your blog; I really enjoy quality character analyses! I completely agree with you.I liked Elena at first, she’s clearly the one we’re supposed to sympathize with and relate to. But slowly you begin to notice how selfish she is. I didn’t agree with the decision to kill Kol either. I also didn’t like how to show kinda skipped over to fact that potentially thousands of vampires just dropped dead. No one feels much remorse? Aren’t these supposed to be the moral heroines?
I was pretty sad when Finn died too. Sadie had FINALLY found him after how long? I just wanted them to leave the drama behind and start a life together away from mystic falls.
Elijah is also my favourite character by far. He’s not innocent but at least he expresses remorse and seems to avoid pointless conflict. I’ve stopped watching vampire diaries and just watch the originals now. I just didn’t really want to root for the characters anymore. They had lost a bit too much of their morality? Common decency?

This has been my most popular entry in YEARS, which just goes to prove how disappointed fans are with Elena.

I like my heroes and heroines to be, as you pointed out, “moral.” As in, not selfish. As in, caring about other people. As in, having a code of right and wrong that they stand on. I can deal with immoral behavior in Damon, because he’s been that way from the start; but the severe change in Elena has not been for the better.

Poor Finn. He deserved a chance at happiness. And Kol was a psychopath, but they did not need to kill him. Just call up his big brothers and let them handle him, as they’ve done many times before.

Elijah is indeed wonderful. I ought to write a post about him sometime. He’s nuanced. Brutal, but full of remorse. Like you, I’ve abandoned TVD for TO. At least there, we have a bit of honor.

I agree with you in regards to Damon. Characters like him and Klaus you expect to do things you disagree with. so I guess Elena is disappointing half because of her decisions, and half because we have certain expectations of our once compassionate heroine.

Your most popular post? Wow. I guess that’s why magazines and the news include pop culture to increase their audience.

I think the turning point for me with Elena was when she refused to really address what she did to Caroline. I get it. Her humanity was off. But … after doing something awful, you don’t just walk away from it or pretend it’s all right. I can’t help comparing her to Angel on Buffy, who was eaten up with remorse after turning evil for awhile. He spends a lot of time trying to make up for what he did, but I don’t see that in Elena… and that disappoints me.

Haha, yes! I think we humans at large enjoy finding people who agree with us! 😀

I’m pretty sure if you guys lost your mom and dad, then found out they weren’t your mom and dad, then you met your real parents, lost them, lost your aunt, then lost someone thats really close to you (alaryic) then your brother? then damon and bonnie, you guys would act way worse than her!

No,I will never act worse than Elena because I still have brain and not narrow minded. I always think what’s the affect if I did something terrible just because I have bad things happen in my life. That’s why we need to remember God and ask him to always ptotect our heart to not doing something useless.

Simply put, I hate this show so much…this series is Just way too focused on some Elena who really isn’t that gorgeous as compared to Bonnie. I guess the reason why the originals was created was because of the unpleasantness the fans were expressing about vampire diaries.

I prefer Bonnie than Elena. Bonnie keep sacrificing herself and life just to help strange vampires and the precious selfish elena who had made Bonnie’s grams dead and her mom turned into vampire. It’s all just for Elena. They all dead or become vampire for nothing but annoying elena who’ve done nothing except whinning, crying, and blaming others. And this season 6 makes me confuse. Elena is getting boring and worse

I don’t know about myself, but judging Elena by the TVD in-universe, there have been others who have dealt with their lots better than her.

Caroline, for example, was abused and raped (compelling someone to have sex with you takes the consent away from the compelled, therefore it is in fact rape) by the guy that Elena decides to forgive and later date and proclaim to be her true love, turned into a vamp with no idea what’s going on and has to figure it out with only Stefan willing to help her, her mom disowns her, Bonnie (who, at that point, could be said to be her only real friend, not someone who viewed her as a friendly afterthought) also disowned her for being a vamp, her dad tried to “fix” her and then he died because he refused to turn into a vamp like her, she was tortured by Mason’s old pack and TYLER hesitated to help her in the moment of truth, and now her mom has died of a brain tumor. For a good majority of these catastrophes, she hasn’t had even a quarter of Elena’s support group and yet she hasn’t gone on a killing spree. How odd.

Bonnie came from a broken home LONG before the GIlberts bit it. Her mom literally abandoned her for a cause (that, oh look, had to do with Elena), her dad was physically in MF but might as well have left for all the attention he paid her, her grams (the SOLE family member who took up responsibility of raising her and loved her) dies because Elena couldn’t bear the thought of Stefan and Damon being trapped in the tomb (never mind that Damon threatened and blackmailed Sheila to open it in the first place), her mom returns and has a foster son whom she loves and raised and NEVER BOTHERED TO EVEN CALL BONNIE, her boyfriend cheats on her with the ghost of his ex-girlfriend (and you’ll note how many times she’ll sacrifice herself for this ungrateful piece of shit), her mom turns into a vamp and leaves her, she loses her magic and is tricked into trying out the dark arts, she dies for the asshole who cheated on her… Sure, Bonnie also went nuts and did horrible things when she snapped, but AT LEAST SHE ADMITS THAT WHAT SHE DID WAS WRONG. Also, much like Caroline, she didn’t have even a quarter of Elena’s unconditionally loving support system. Hell, after Sheila died, do you know who was comforting Bonnie and trying to help her (even if it was something as simple as hugging her and calling her to make sure she’s alright)? Caroline. Not Elena. Elena didn’t even apologize for unknowingly asking Sheila to sacrifice herself for the Salvatores.

If you put Elena next to Bonnie and Caroline, Elena’s reactions (considering how many people are willing to help her and unconditionally love her) come off as spoilt and bratty. No, really, Caroline and Bonnie’s self-discipline is nothing short of amazing. Because at this point, if Bonnie and Caroline said “You know what? Fuck it!” and slaughtered anyone that so much as looked like they were going to mess with the girls, I would get it. It wouldn’t even be paranoia at this point since someone is always out to destroy what remnants of happiness Bonnie and Caroline find.

I’m so sick of Elena. She’s so annoying. She was unbearably whiny when she first turned into a vampire. It angered me when she was able to kick Caroline’s butt due to being “trained” by Alaric. There’s no way skinny ass Elena would win in a fight against Caroline. It was so unbelievable. I don’t think Caroline was a hypocrite for sleeping with Klaus. Klaus is HOT and treats Caroline like a queen. Who can blame her? I also hate how Damon tried to kill Jeremy and killed an entire family’s bloodline, but Elena’s totally cool with it bc she’s “in love”. I don’t think Elena and Damon should have lasted longer than a season. She should have realized she was only attracted to him, but actually loves Stefan. I’m sick of the breaking up and getting back together every other episode. And how do you not realize your so called best friend has been dead all summer? All she cares about is herself.

Yeah, except when he’s fatally stabbing her and leaving her to die, or mind-controlling Tyler to infect her with a werewolf bite, or using her as leverage against the Elena trio.

You can’t be mad at Elena for loving Damon despite all his misdeeds, but support Caroline’s relationship with Klaus. It’s self-contradicting, because Klaus and Damon are exactly alike, except Klaus is even more vindictive, petty, and controlling.

I kind of disagree with that. I’m a firm believer that the tropes used are not bad in and of themselves, rather it’s HOW they’re written that makes them good or bad. For example, both Buffy and Twilight make use of the same “vampire guy and human girl fall in love for the first time” trope but Buffy’s excellent writing makes it into a great starter romance between a girl who feels isolated due to her duty and a vampire who has lost his family due to his new soul and is struggling with morals. Meanwhile, Twilight’s atrocious writing made it a story about a passive-aggressive girl who cares about nothing and no one but her vampire ideal and an indirectly abusive vampire boy who acts like an adolescent thug and throws his weight around to look cool. It’s all about the details.

The same goes for pairings: people can like a pairing dynamic (like Foe-Yay for example) but hate a pairing that uses that dynamic because they hate one or both characters that are a part of the pairing. I can like Klaroline because of the details and the (accidental) good writing. The details you mentioned: Klaus attacked Caroline with a coat-rack and bit her, this was AFTER he figured out that Caroline had been part of the plot trying to get him desiccated and put in his sister’s body AND his brother’s corpse is right in front of him (so he’s suspecting that maybe Caroline was part of the plot). At this point, Caroline is the enemy who did him dirty BECAUSE of the loyalty he loves in her. It was not a petty reason that led him to bite her but a genuine battleground. The pairing essentially showed just how complicated and gray it is to balance out your loyalty to family AND how much you like someone. Also, Klaus made the decision to spare Tyler in spite of him trying to kill him, something that for a good majority of his life (not to mention HUMAN customs from the majority of the eras he’s lived through) would be considered foolish and weak. All of this was for Caroline. He made the decision to forgive her plotting against him when he was making deals with her group in good faith. When he first had Tyler bite her, he did not know her, THEN he changed his nomination of Caroline from “enemy” to “person I like.” Once that part is overcome, they provide an interesting dynamic and their personalities mesh well, without Klaus trying to change her. If anything her “light” is what attracts him to her. Like I said, it’s the little details that have me sold on this pairing. I like how Caroline slowly realizes that people can do bad things for good reason (like when she killed the witches to save Bonnie’s life). And sure, Klaus called her in on it, but he still dug the graves so she wouldn’t have to. It’s complex, it’s interesting, but they still have lives outside of what they have and they don’t neglect that. He even decided to pull an “I want my beloved to be happy” during Caroline’s graduation by letting Tyler go back to MF without hunting him (he also did the same during prom night).

As you can see, I like my characters with shades of gray. I like “anti-heroes” and “anti-villains” or even traditional heroes going darker. I also like my traditional heroes sometimes. What I don’t like is when a nominal hero is acting like an anti-hero (at best) but then turns around and hypocritically acts all sanctimonious and holier-than-thou.

Meanwhile, I already knew I wouldn’t care much for Delena or anything Damon because while I can enjoy an anti-villain, rape (attempted or successful) is the one line I don’t tolerate (hence why I never liked Tyler, he tried to rape Vicky when she kept on saying no and only stopped when Jeremy surprised him). Also, when Damon snapped Jeremy’s neck the first time (when no one knew about the Gilbert rings), he did it simply because Elena and Katherine rejected him. It’s a petty reason to betray your friend’s trust and kill their family member. That basically defines Damon’s reasons for doing things if they have nothing to do with Elena, he does it to be petty. Meanwhile, Klaus is his own person outside of a relationship and he does things for a reason (occasionally he can be petty, but not as much as people think).

For me, Damon and Elena have a hard time existing outside of a relationship (one-sided or not) since their actions are defined by who they’re with (or want to be with since season 1 Damon did things because he wanted to be with Katherine or because he was petty). That makes their characters unappealing on top of their unbelievably unlikeable characteristics. If I want to see pinballs doing what an author thinks is cool, I’ll write my own story thanks.

Caroline and Klaus, meanwhile, are their own characters outside of romantic relationships and I like who they are as individuals. I wouldn’t ship Klaroline if I didn’t like Caroline or Klaus as individuals. Meanwhile, I don’t care for Damon or Elena as individuals, why would I care about their relationship to each other? That’s also the reason I don’t like Stelena either. If I don’t like Elena as an individual, I don’t like ANY Elena pairing.

I 100% Agree! The whole Damon and Elena relationship is getting old since all they do is have sex, break up, get back together, and more sex… BORING. That is not love. I’ve never really been a big fan of their relationship. Elena’s character become worse when she got together with Damon because she doesn’t care about anyone anymore.. just her “love” for damon. Which is ridiculous when all anyone does is sacrifice their life FOR HER. What attracted me to this show was the relationship between Stefan and Elena. But the show wasn’t JUST about them in the earlier series. Now, TVD has unfortunately become the delena diaries. I really hope Stefan and Elena find their way back to each other and Elena returns to her old self. I also find it disgusting that the writers would create a storyline where Elena falls “in love” with the OTHER BROTHER…. that is quite messed up and disturbing in my mind. And it just doesn’t make sense.

Agreed. I have stopped watching since first 15 minutes in episode 1 season 6 that quite boring and pointless. I never want to watch this show again otherwise I had watch season 1-3 for like 3 times. I like Alaric and Klaus but they can’t impress me anymore in season 4 and 5 (for Klaus) and 6 (for Alaric). Both characters are just like losing their soul and character itself as at the beginning of the show

Same here with the Delena-Issues. Damon and Elena are not a fit. Elena is/was a purely kind person to whom it was most important that other people were save while Damon still doesn’t give a s*** about anyone who is not Elena or important for her well being. So they bent Elena more and more until all she could say when Damon did something unforgiveable again was “But I still love you” which is the worst character development that I have ever seen on screen. There is nothing that defines her anymore other than her “love” for Damon. And that is not Elenas fault. She could have had the potential of being a great strong person. I blame the writers and their bad writing.
And by the way: What does that say about Damon that he tolerates such a huge change about someone he loves? I mean what does he even love about her/What did he even love her about her in the beginning? Has he ever mentioned that?

God and still it took me so much time to quit watching the series. I started to dislike it in season 4 and stopped watching in the beginning of season 6! I just couldn’nt stand Elena self-pitty stream after the death of the guy she has known for two years and had some Sex with. Seriously, never have I seen a sign of special trust oder bonding between them that shows that they can actually spend more than a few month with each other. All they do is give in to some oh so sparkling chemistry, break up, make up/make out…. There is no continuity if you know what I mean. Elena dealt so well with the death of beloved Jenna, Alaric and so on. But Damon dies and suddenly she goes crazy? This show is just proof of how disgusting a love like Delena is when you consider self-esteem. When you disappear completely into another person and have no own character traits left that make it possible for you to define yourself. The beginning of Season 6 showed me for good: Elena does’t exist anmore. A Damon-Groupie, that is all she is. And by the way: Remarkable how fast she got over Bonnies death there. After she made Ric compel her to forget about Damon there was absolutely no grief left. Her best friend for years but Damon ist the the golden statue. Sure. Well, at least the Delena-Fans are fine. I feel like they were the only ones that kept the show running. And of course those who hope for a Klaroline-reunion. Keep hoping. Never gonna happen. Not that I care.

I just started watching this show cause my friend kept telling me to watch it. I gave it a chance and really liked season 1. Im on the second season and Elena is getting on my nerves! I dont like her anymore. She’s a drama queen who has to have all the attention. The whole I love you Stefan but ur a vampire so we can’t be together, to the we can make it work, to I cant be with you cause I. Gotta take care -of my family, to its all my fault and I wanna be with you anyway. Its so annoying! Oh and how she thinks she can control Damon and Stefan. PLEASE WRITERS STOP MAKING EVERYTHING ABOUT ELENA!! I DONT LIKE HER ANYMORE! I DONT EVEN KNOW IF I CAN CONTINUE TO WATCH THE REST OF THE SEASONS. ELENA MAKES ME SO AGGRAVATED. LL

I didn’t like Damon or Elena at all during Season 3. Let’s start with Damon. Stefan was forced to sacrifice everything to save his life, and, here he is trying to steal the love of his life. NOT COOL. Elena kisses Damon not once, but TWICE. I was like, what the hell? When I thought that she had finally came to her senses & realized who was good for her…she hops into the sack with Damon?!? I couldn’t watch another episode after that, I didn’t even watch “Season 5”. Stefan has sacrificed so much for Elena & Damon. Examples:

Season 1 | Fool Me Once: Stefan sacrifices his freedom, when he hears Elena scream from inside the tomb. After everything Damon has done, Stefan begs him to leave the tomb with him, before they both end up being trapped.
Season 1 | Founder’s Day: Stefan saves Damon from John Gilbert, who tries to burn him alive.
Season 2 | Rose: Stefan apologizes to Damon for forcing him to complete his transition & explains the reason of why he did it.
Season 2 | The Sacrifice: Stefan sacrifices his freedom once again, when Katherine tries to kill Jeremy.
Season 2 | The Dinner Party: Stefan saves Damon (AGAIN!) when he learns that Damon will die, if he uses the dagger.
Season 2 | The Sun Also Rises: Stefan OFFERS himself to be sacrificed to save Jenna’s life. Even after his attempt to turn Elena into a vampire, Stefan promises to Damon that he will do whatever it takes to save his life.
Season 3 | The Hybrid: After a horrid summer with Klaus, Stefan still can’t let his brother die & saves him on the mountain range.
Season 3 | Ordinary People: After having his humanity turned off by Klaus, Stefan saves Damon (how many times has he done that) when Mikael is about to rip out Damon’s heart.
Season 4 | Growing Pains: Stefan put Elena’s life, before his. He gets shot in the chest (TWICE!). But, he manages to viciously murder one of the guards, to stop Elena from dying.

Your forgetting that Damon fell in love with Katherine whom was only in love with stephan and toyed with Damon. Stephan then begged damon to complete his transformation so Stephan wouldn’t be alone. Then when Stephan became the ripper Damon went behind and cleanedbup after him. Then Damon was tortured by the augustins and nearly died and Stephan had no idea nor care. I think that what Stephan’s done to Damon in the beginning makes perfect sense on why Damon treats Stephan like he does. Specially makes sense on why Damon went after elana, and why he tortured Stephan. Why isn’t it fair that Damon be happy, and loved and for stephan to sacrifice for damon?

I agree with you. The writers seemed to show the righteous Stefan first in some seasons to make Damon look bad no matter what he had done to Stefan and Elena. And when the audience already judge damon as a villain, all Damon does to save other people life aren’t necessary again because of the stefan-elena-should-back-together-because-they-had-chemistry things. People and specially elena keep judging damon as a bastard in all seasons thats so weird. Even Damon-Liz or Damon-Alaric or Damon-Enzo scenes steal my attention than all stefan and elena scenes in all seasons. The friendship Damon has is all that I care about and makes me believe that bad guy is actually still have heart and even better than the hypocrite elena and stefan.

THANK YOU!! So ridiculous that she falls in love with Damon after everything Stefan has been put through for her. I have never been a fan of Damon and Elena. Elena has not become a better person with Damon even though Damon claims she makes him a better person. I LOVE THIS SHOW during the earlier season with Stefan and Elena together but now the delena storyline has made the show fall apart. I could barely handle it for a season and now the writers want to continue it in season 6. Nobody wants to watch the delena diaries.. their relationship is getting old. WAKE UP ELENA and realize stefan is your epic love. I hope her relationship with Damon makes her realize this

I totally agree with you.
I think I hated her the most in season 4.
When Damon turned her humanity off she acts like a freaking rebellious kid. Damon had not right to say but when he said without her humanity shes a “cold bitch” I was clapping at my computer. I mean I felt bad for her when she was in denial about Jeremy and also her mental breakdown.

But seriously?????? Every single time she says she likes herself his way I cringe.

Elena Gilbert, Bella Swan, and the like are a type of ‘heroine’ I would like to see fade away.

People often criticize Buffy for not immediately killing Angel when he turned into Angelus, but in the end she looked into ANGEL’s eyes, kissed him goodbye, and sent him to hell to save the world. Elena, Bella, Sookie, and others would have just gone on kissing their respective lovers as the world was pulled into hell around them.

I’m not sure that I ever liked Elena too much. She overestimated herself in my opinion. Like she uses er friendship as leverage to control people. Who cares whether or not you like them anyways? And she tests people soooo much. Both her and Caroline. Yes its selfless but you have to know when you’re pushing too far. Like when Klaus compelled Stefan to kill her, instead of leaving like Stefan begged her too she waited till the last minute to run. Just cause she thinks he’s strong enough. Trying to resist compulsion is hell and she doesn’t make it any easier by being stubborn. Another thing that pissed me off is when she was coming down on Stefan for wanting human blood. Helloooooo he’s a vampire what do you expect?! Its not like he can control his urges. And when people are trying to protect her she doesn’t listen. She goes behind their backs and does what she wants because she wants to make er own decisions even if they put everyone else at risk. Just listen for once. I can go forever about her. I’m a delena shipper but after she slept with Damon and Rebecca compelled her to tell the truth in the library…she had no right to be mad at Stefan for wanting to forget! You got Damon! Why do you need Stefan to stay in love with you?! You can’t have them both Elena. Its so selfish of her to want him to keep the memories of her just so she can feel loved. I mean you’ve hurt him enough already so the least you could do is let the guy move on.

I sooooo agree with you!! When she was like “Stefan? What the fuck, why would you want to forget?” Like, god. She still wants him to remember that he loved her and that he is heartbroken because of her, like, what the hell? Let him forget, it would be a lot easier for him. Also that time when Stefan slept with Katherine, she was like “Why would you do that?” and Stefan totally was like “And you slept with Damon, you have a lot to say about that right?” I hate her! But I totally love Nina Dobrev.

I really hate Elena…I like Tyler… people may think that is stupid but I have some reasons

Tyler is the one of the most underestimated character in the show. He lost both his parents and his uncle, lost his girlfriend to his nemesis, he is an alpha, lost his pack when klaus decapitated them or ripped their heart out.

When the Salvatores were planning on killing Klaus back in season 3, they did not care much about Tyler (although Stefan brought him up and hesitated) he was strong enough to accept his fate if Klaus died. He was wronged by Hayley. He had an abusive father, who pushed him around. He turned atleast a 100 times in the mountains to break free of the sire bond for the girl he loves, the girl who forgot all about that. Yes, his thirst for revenge made him lose the girl but can you blame him? Everyone was mad at him on how he reacted when he found out about Klays and Caroline. I mean, who wouldn’t? His former lover being together with his mother’s murderer. We may not have seen much interaction between Jenna and Tyler but he is not oblivious to her murder by Klaus.

He learnt to be a part of the team when Elena was still going through her transition and took a stake to his heart… so no matter how much impatient, short-tempered guy he seems to be, he also has a good heart..

I really didn’t like Tyler in the first season. His treatment of Vicky wasn’t the best — not taking no for an answer … but I got to where I really liked him later on in the series. He’s had just as much heartache as any other character (more, actually, as you point out) but is never given any breaks, and is expendable as far as Elena is concerned, because she doesn’t care about him. She’s… I hate her. 😛

I loved seeing this blog. Thought I was the only one that disliked Elena. I’ve disliked her since season 2 during her “sacrifice myself to Klaus” phase to “protect her “family and friends”. Nevermind that Klaus was going to use Caroline and Tyler as his key ingredients. And in the end,it backfired,Aunt Jenna and Uncle John died just so she can “make decisions”. I also used to like Caroline particularly how she was there for Tyler selflessly during his werewolf stage. But they are ruining her character by turning her into a Stefan worshipper and a hypocrite. I don’t expect her to encourage Elena to date Damon but I expected her to be Elena’s friend not a Stefan shipper. Particularly since she slept with Klaus,she can tone down on the judgement. Elena is just a whinny,selfish character,the best the writers can do for her is to end the love triangle and have her stick to Damon already. Else she’ll look even worse if she keeps going back and forth. The best person is still Bonnie,she isn’t perfect but she truly puts her all into saving her friends,sometimes her life. That’s why I can’t Ship Bamon,Bonnie already has it rough in TVD,last thing she needs is a damaged boyfriend to “save”. But TVD needs to salvage all these characters,bring more Defan love,more girl love and more character growth. Its been too Elena-centric since season2.

I think the only character that hasn’t been shitty or a bitch one way or the other is BONNIE. And you see how fucked up Julie pled made her life. Like she got no romantic interests other than Jeremy and her step brother. That’s like Elena making out with Jeremy. I thought bamon was better not berry or at least stefonnie because they are both good characters. I think in the end no Salvatore brother should get Elena because if you look at it from a close point of view she really wasn’t worth it. She is the main damsel in distress character when she has all the tools to become the badass. Caroline is a vampire just like her and she is a badass. Bonnie is not even that of a powerful witch and she is a TOTAL badass no matter how empty and crappy they make her lines. They practically made TVD the delena- Stefan alone triangle show. The originals is wayyyy better. I think it’s quite the find for TVD unless they have a miracle story line and totally step up their game- like how bout do a what if with Bonnie becoming the most powerful of one of the most powerful witch or move her to the originals or produce bamon…etc. same with Caroline too. Of maybe moved Caroline, Bonnie, Stefan Damon, Matt, and Jeremy to the originals. Just saying everyone is always talking about Elena no one cares how Bonnie countless sly literally countlessly saved her life not just for Elena but for EVERY main character on the show. Like seriously Bonnie is the main hero and ONLY hero in TVD with Caroline and Stefan maybe Damon even though they made him fall over heel obsessed with Elena and a weak character. In conclusion seasons 1,2,3, and maybe eye 4 except the delena scenes were great. And isn’t weird that with all the fans rooting for bamon this is one of the only relationships that hadn’t taken place but Elena and Matt did. And Damon and Bonnie hold hands only in their death. They could have had a love/hate relationship. Anyway sorry for the rant great article and author by the way.

Yes you’re right, Bonnie isn’t a saint but she gives and sacrifices more than the rest of the characters combined.

Bonnie treated Caroline horribly after Care’ s transformation but as much as I didn’t like that I understood. Bonnie’s encounters with Vampires up until that point were volatile. I don’t believe she knew how much of Caroline’s humanity would still be in tact. She was scared.

Now on the other hand Bonnie lost a grandmother, her mother was turned, father was killed. She had been threatened more than once, forced to do things against her will….and most of these things were inflicted by Vampires. A flipping coin was tossed to decide the fate of Bonnie and her mom despite the fact this girl continuously helps and risks herself., yet they didn’t respect her enough to let her know about the whole Elijah/Elena situation. Even after everything she is still selfless, and she is selfless for friends that couldn’t even take the time to realize something was up after the end of season 4, no one realized she was dead until they needed a spell.

I’m sorry but the way Caroline was treated in season 2 pales in comparison to the shit Bonnie deals with.

Agreed. The way Bonnie treat caroline in season two is kinda normal for a teenage girl. Bonnie should be the main character instead of elena and caroline. and caroline isn’t that worth to be the main character. She’s so damn annoying and over reacting at everything

I definitely agree!! Although I love and still hope for stefan and elena I think she should should be single for once in her life! I hate how the show has made everything about elena and the delena diaries. Bonnie has been put through so much crap on this show and the characters barely care about her. Especially Elena who claims she will do anything to save the ones she loves. All she has done is fall in “love” with Damon and not care about anyone else! Other characters are only ever saved/rescued if they are needed to protect Elena! Ugh such ridiuclousness TVD has come to

Couldn’t agree more. And I’m not starting to write my opinion about Elena down here because 1.) that’d take long and I don’t want to waste too much time on that selfish bitch and 2.) it’s all been said . Just wanted to thank you for posting that it warms my heart ;D Even though I know that he was a lunatic blablabla I LOVED Kol from day 1. Gosh, how happy I was when Silas killed Jeremy! That was so deserved. I just hoped he’d kill Elena, too. Instead Jeremy returned. Ugh, seriously Bonnie? Okay, I have to stop now, I’m getting angry 😀
Oh and about quitting TVD, yes I had the same thought after they killed off Katherine (Why always my favs?) but then (Spoiler alert) Kol returned in episode 18 and they got me again… I am addicted to tvd.

They tried sucking me back into the series with the Kol stunt — but he was there for what, five minutes? Not long enough, my friends. I watched up through the finale without shedding a tear and then called it quits. I’m done. I’ll rewatch the first three (good) seasons, but next year, I’m out. 😛

Not even five. Three maybe. But that was enough to keep me till season finale. Oh, thank god, you were annoyed, too? Everyone cried and was shocked and all but I really was disappointed. Kinda expected more from a tvd season finale… If Vampire Diaries stays that way I will seriously quit. Yeah I already rewatched season 1-3 and compared to them season 5 sucked. How many times Delena actually broke up? A few more and they compete with Jeremy’s deaths. Like 10 times meantime? The only one I like on TVD is Enzo and I’m pretty sure they’re gonna ruin him, too. Well, but there’s still hope for Kol’s return on the Originals, since news are spreading all over the internet. Am I the only one having the feeling like Hayley is the Originals-Elena?

Here’s the thing: when you kill off characters and make me feel sad, then BRING THEM back, why should I care when you do it a second time? I love Damon, in the I-Hate-Him-Too kind of way, but why cry about his death since I know he’ll be back in three episodes? Ditto with Stefan. Fool me once, shame on you, writers!

It kind of all went in the trash can when they flipped off the Delena fans by introducing the sire bond as an excuse for why they were together. From there, it descended into utter tripe, with so many people running around wearing the same face that it immediately got boring. So, Elena and Stefan are DESTINED to fall in love? WTF? That’s pretty much when emotionally, I divorced the series.

*sigh*

If they bring back Kol for The Originals, I will be a happy girl. They need him on that show to raise a little hell, since all Klaus does is whine and cry. I happen to like Hayley, but I’m hoping they don’t turn her into Elena. I’d hate to go through that again. 😛

I kinda lost interest in Damon since the whole Delena crap. It ruined his character, imo. I LOVED Damon in season 1,2 and maaaaybe 3 but then he got highly obsessed with her and that’s super-annoying.
I mean first he does everything for her and they get together and then all this ‘We’re bad for each other’ stuff, nah.
You can’t take death seriously on TVD. I even forgot Damon is dead since he’s coming back for sure. Sometimes I get the feeling like the writers are running out of ideas. So, they basically killed off both main male characters just to shock the SE/DE fans and bring them back so the SE/DE fans are happy and keep watching. The damn love-triangle got so boring and I’m so sick of it! Can’t she just choose please? Ugh.
Yeah the sire bond was just a consolation for the Stelena fans… I bet in season 6 she’s gonna come back to Stefan and so on and so on…
Although it looks like Stefan is gonna hook up with Caroline.
Yes, Stefan and Elena are meant to be, Elena will NEVER forgive Damon (season 2), he has lost her FOREVER,its ALWAYS gonna be Stefan…
I don’t care about The Shipping Diaries anymore.
OOOOOh, and should I even start with Silas?? That guy was the 2nd worst villain ever! Right after that Markos guy. John Gilbert was scarier! I had high expectations because Kol was so scared and all that shit and then Silas turned out to be crap. Markos was a joke.
Jepp, I can’t wait for season 2 of TO, with Esther and Mikael and Finn being back. Have the feeling like that’s going to be a party of its own! And Kol’s return would make the show perfect for me.
Hayley… nah, I never really cared for her, sorry.

I don’t think Hayley will be like Elena. Unlike Rapunzel-wanna-be Hayley seems to actually be able to handle herself. Yes she tends to be kidnapped and nearly killed ALOT, but she actually manages to find a way out of her situations before Elijah and Klaus come to rescue her. Yes she definitely has her flaws like all the others (even my fav Bonnie who is admittedly very judgemental but rightfully so), but she is still in my opinion waaayyy better than cry baby attention seeking Elena.

I completely agree with you there. I love Elena form season 1 and 2. I even find qualities in her that I aspire to have. But season 4 and (especially) 5 are complete nonsense. She has completely lost the person she used to be, along with every other character. Caroline had made so much progress and matured when she became a vampire, and now she’s right back to how she used to be. Bonnie had become strong, yet now he character feels empty. So many good things ruined. That’s why I always stick to the first seasons.

This show has no moral standings and to many selfish self centred characters if the show had been done right and not lagged out it would have ended in the second season and not get so much hate like Elena what kind of main character is that? I want to reach through the screen and slap her a thousand times. Somebody should have told the producer that when somebody or something I suppose takes an innocent life theirs should hold no value and should have their own taken like common it’s a town full of killers and non are having to deal with any consequences for murder

I’m not even watching the show anymore. Once they killed Katherine, I lost all interest in it. So… I haven’t been there for the last few episodes, in which I hear they killed off one of the trio (… probably temporarily, knowing this show’s tendency to act like a daytime soap opera). Sigh. What a mess. It used to be so good.

99.9 percent agree with you all the way! She really needs a raincheck – in retrospect, she deserves lesser than Stefan and Damon (and Matt kinda). Knowing how CW and all TV series end their TV shows, she’ll probably die in the end telling both Damon and Stefan how much she loves them both – which concludes in Stefan’s diary of him and Damon moving on, but united; cause seriously? If we focus on Damon and Stefan, you’ll realise how strong their family bond is (in a love/hate/angry/destorying way).

Julie Plec should really focus on the character development instead of making it a twilight remake – no moral or context to it.

I honestly don’t know how they would end it at this point, because if she winds up with either Salvatore brother and the other one is still alive, half the fans will be angry! When you create a love triangle in a show, you are forever running the risk of upsetting half your fan base at any given time — which, to me, is stupid. If anything, I suspect one Salvatore will die, leaving Elena to live “happily ever after” with the other one. *gag*

To be honest, I never liked her. I found her annoying and selfish in the first season, for example…. When Caroline became a vampire, it was kind of Elena’s fault (kind of), you know because Katherine turned her…. And Elena hadn’t told her the truth….. AND Elena never said anything like ‘I’m so sorry this happened to you Caroline’ Nothing! She always cared more about herself but her friends always save her. I way prefer Caroline. Elena thinks she’s too perfect, where as Caroline wants to be but knows she’s not.

In retrospect, yes, she’s selfish. I didn’t really see it until later in the series, though. But like you, I always much preferred Caroline — she’s a much nicer person, more focused on other people than herself. Elena would kill someone to protect Stefan — Caroline wouldn’t. It’s not just all about what she wants.

Oh I thought I was about to explode when all my friends were on the defend Elena train. I seriously cannot stand her and I thought I was the only one. Before I start my rant, can I just say I love you guys<3 haha okay now; I never liked her and now hitting mid season 4 where she killed another original, like WTF how are people okay with that? And omg yes thank you Rebekah, she finally said what I’ve been thinking this whole time. That maybe they aren’t so different after all. They both do what they do for their loved ones. But Elena single-handedly orchestrated the death of two originals and literally stabbed Rebekah in the back. If I was Rebekah, oh man, Elena would not be walking around being the selfish ass bitch she is. Like yeah, those two originals weren’t necessarily good people but what makes her so different from them? She has blood on her hands too and because those two were originals, she has so much more blood on her hands than she can count. I just don’t understand? How are people just okay with that? Killing an original means killing their entire bloodline. How is that justified? And that concludes my anger of the moment, hanks for reading my rant(:

It… isn’t justified. It just isn’t. I realize that Kol was a threat and largely uncontrollable, but if Bonnie could trap Klaus inside that house after they murdered Kol, she could have trapped Kol inside the house too. Also, why not call Elijah? He’s always managed his siblings — between he and Klaus, I think they had enough ways to control Kol without planning his murder for a selfish reason. That’s really what it comes down to — Elena wanted to complete the hunter’s mark all at once, by killing thousands of vampires in one go. Nice plan… if you care nothing about innocent third parties.

Klaus or even Elijah could’ve controlled Kol…..it’s called a dagger. While I never hated Elena, it was Kol’s death that proved how selfish she is. The thousands of Vampires that shared Kol’s fate weren’t even thought of enough to stall this decision because Elena couldn’t deal with reality…..again. This was all about Elena. She couldn’t take being a Vampire which is ironic because she chose to stay in a relationship with one and is usually surrounded by them. Elena becoming a Vampire was inevitable.

What made it exponentially worse for me, was that earlier that season, when Klaus turned that bar full of people so Jeremy could finish his mark, Elena threw a hissy fit.
Likewise when Stefan turned that remorseless murderer to kickstart the mark’s growth.

Yet she had absolutely NO PROBLEM murdering an Original, and by extension THOUSANDS of others, rather than a few dozen, for literally no reason other than,”I want this cure! Except I actually don’t!”.

And that was her actual reason. I mean, I’d cry if she was stupid enough to think that killing Kol wasn’t going to cause ridiculous amounts of collateral damage, but no! No, she was fine with mass-murder, so she could get the cure. And kill off the ONLY person who wasn’t in this for selfish reasons to boot. Yep, Kol was the GOOD guy in this scenario, trying to save the world from having hell brought down upon it (in the form of EVERY SUPERNATURAL MONSTER WHO HAS EVER LIVED AND HAS A DAMNED GOOD REASON TO BE PISSED OFF).

All that aside, Klaus was going to deal with it, Elijah would have dealt with it, hell, REBEKAH would have helped them dagger Kol at that point, he tried to KILL her. The bitch. Okay. I’m done ranting now. It’s just that if I do it anywhere else people scream at me. Elena fanatics…..”shivers”. Scare the crap out of me.

I don’t know how anyone can defend Elena. It’s just impossible. She is insanely selfish.

Kol was a murderous little psychopath (ie, a lot of fun) but he had legitimate reasons for wanting to stop them from raising Silas. Elena set up his murder. It was premeditated and unnecessary, because a) Klaus was taking care of it, b) Elijah could have taken care of it (Kol actually respected and feared Elijah, I think), and c) as you pointed out, Rebekah could have helped them. All they would have had to do is sneak Jeremy out of town for awhile, stake Kol for awhile, and be done with it. But no, Elena wanted the cure (and didn’t) and for Damon to be free of compulsion (why can’t another Original compel compulsion off? there’s a loophole they haven’t explained yet), so Kol was sacrificed. Boo.

yes!!!! the dagger, and that what Klaus said when he saw Kol’s burning body. He was like he was going to make him suffer on his terms(the dagger) but yep, once again Elena’s feelings comes before everyone else’s and she killed an entire bloodline because they were just a means to an end with her. like every single character that is involved with Elena. I’m surprised that everyone she knows, talks to or is friends with isn’t dead right now.

As much as i love Stefan, he is so stupid. still saving the girl that is doing it like bunnyrabbits with your brother; he needs to let elena go. everyone needs to let elena go.

I agree with you. Rebekah was demonized for killing Elena in order to save her entire family, but Elena not only helped to kill TWO of Bex’s brothers but then tried to lie and say ”oh, it was self defense we only killed him because he was going to kill us” and everyone defends her because she can’t handle being a vampire. I have to say I like Katherine more than Elena. Yes Kat is a murdering manipulative lying bitch, but at least she owns her crap.

To be honest I used to like katherine from the beginning of the show until season 4. And then she became human and did something stupid in elena’s body, I started to hate her. But then I rethink about her reason to do it was because she never got the man he loved. First Elijah and then Stefan. But these two guys dumped her because she was a manipulative bitch and selfish who killed so many people to survive, while they forgot about themselves who killed many people to survive too. Now I regret that I ever hated Katherine and defended Elena because of damon’s happines was on her. Katherine was much more fun and classy than boring and self-centered elena. Elena should thank her because if Katherine didn’t change the salvators then she will be forever end up with matt and maybe she deals with the originals alone and soon end up dead.

Oh thank heavens that I have found so many Elena Haters :D. Really I think my dislike of her character a few episodes into the fourth season. She had been whinny since the beginning. She is unbearable in s5.

I love Elijah(who does not). Remember the time she conspired with his bitch witch of a mother to kill all the originals including Elijah? The witch who brought Klaus’ wrath on the world by putting that curse on him and then abandoning him? Klaus had to pay for something SHE did. Yes he is manipulative and psychopathic but who would not turn into a complete psycho after years and years of parental abuse and abandonment? If Klaus is evil, so is everyone else on the show ( save for my dear Matt <3). Even my favorite Elijah had done some terrible things. Elena you have slept around. slaughtered, conspired , manipulated- how are you different from Klaus ?

I stand Damon anymore. I can see why Klaus acts the way he does. He was abused, abandoned, rejected and humiliated and cursed. So I get where he is coming from. WTF is wrong with Damon? I have given up on TVD period. I love the originals. I love the fact they have created a multifaceted character out of a fairly one dimensional Klaus. I am surprised at myself actually but I am rooting for the guy 🙂

Speaking of Katherine, I can’t stand her. She should die and stay dead. I watched degrassi, 2nd generation. Sorry Nina, I did not like you as Mia too.
Someone mentioned the books. Yeah I have read ALL of them. Elena was NOT a slutty bitch there.

Oh, you’re not alone in your hatred for Elena. She really is unbearable this season – but then, the entire SHOW, in my opinion, is unbearable.
I love Elijah, and I like Caroline, although my opinion of her went in the toilet once she slept with Klaus, thereby turning her into a big, fat hypocrite for judging Elena for being with Damon. Elijah is the most honorable one in the bunch. Klaus is an abusive, childish psychopath. I’m afraid I can’t share your fondness for him, but at least we have a mutual contempt for Elena, right?

Yes I agree with you, completely and absolutely 🙂 – on both counts actually. I always wondered how could she judge Damon for his lack of humanity when she herself killed 12 people !!!! Not to mention she killed someone the day she turned into a bloody vampire no pun intended. 😀 loved your article by the way. Keep posting.

Elenas a bitch…shes the one who always needs to be saved.I liked her more as a human she was so caring (kinda got annoying) and now as a vampire shes a slutty brat.i still dont know why stefen still wants her, he can do so much better.shes such a hypocrite. Its like i like it when somebody physically hurts he.Katherine is a bitch but at least she admits she is.shes so selfish she doesn’t realize shes killed so many innocent people to her pathetic self .she sleeps around with damon…thinking its ok but when stefen sleeps with Katherine its not ok..so who else thinks elena should rot in hell??sure as hell i do

Preach it!
I am totally on the hate train when it comes to one Elena Gilbert.
It is sad, because I really, really wanted to love the show.
But the main character (Elena) fails what I call the Acathla Test. Namely, if the only way to save the world is to kill the person you love most, would you save the world?
I forget her exact quote, but Elena basically says she would be there making out with Angel (as played by the Salvatore Brothers) as the world gets flushed into hell. And her actions back that up.
Considering she moved Heaven and Earth to protect Klaus, who murdered the woman who was raising her, it would not surprise me if she would still protect Stefan if he bathed in the entrails of a busload of preschoolers then had a freshly-squeezed baby-smoothie in a Jeremy-skull sippy cup as a chaser right in front of her.

Yeah. Kinda hate the moral relativism that permeates the show. On the plus side, it did provoke a Buffy marathon at my house. So all ended well.

Yeah, when you compare Elena to Buffy, Elena really looks like a selfish brat. Buffy saved the world and died to save it WITHOUT whining about it. And she sent Angel into a hell dimension because she had to — in spite of loving him.

Sounds about right, Granted a majority of characters on the show are selfish, granted Damon and Katherine are quite upfront about it, Damon is a sadist and Katherine is narcissistic but what makes them better than Elena is that they admit it, even Caroline admits she’s selfish. By the way aside from Matt and Jeremy and Bonnie, who on that cast of characters hasn’t murdered anyone? Even Caroline has commited mass murder

I’m so glad I am not alone! Honestly I tried to like Elena, and I actually did in season one and two (maybe three as well). But unfortunately, she became boring. And I feel like she always repeats herself by accusing others with something. And she is SO WHINY! Why Elena are you so whiny about everything? I totally get that she had a very hard time with everything that happened to her, but honestly the producers are able to create characters that can deal with huge problems in a cool way that makes all the fans love the character even more, but somehow that misses when we talk about Elena. I mean Nina Dobrev does a really good job playing two characters and I love Katherine. I just wish Elena would be cool in her way as well. You know it would be kinda cool to like the protagonist of the show, if that’s missing how long will the show be able to keep going?

Katherine is all kinds of fun. Not to mention, she has saved/helped the main cast in so many ways (far more than she harmed them; her little monologue even points it all out…..albeit with a bitchy attitude). And yet, she’s killed off and sucked into the Dark Dimension, when people like Mikael (who massacred entire vilages/towns/cities, and was said to have wreaked havoc across half of Europe in his singleminded pursuit of the murder of his own son) get to go to the Other Side, and people like Klaus (who destroyed her life, and shaped her into the person she became) get redemption arcs.

I really do dislike the writers. They waste good plot lines in favor of stupid, redundant ones. Killing off Katharine, one of the few characters I actually liked and found interesting, was the last straw for me. I’m done with TVD. I may stay with TO, but we’ll see.

ahhhhh – glad I am not alone!! 🙂 I just finished season 3 and I already am getting annoyed of Elena. It annoys me how it is ALWAYS about her. Yes, I get the show revolves around her but there are other characters and shes annoying me now… I plan on finishing season 4 this weekend so I can only imagine how my feelings for her will change! AHH!

No, you’re not alone. A LOT of people can’t stand Elena, particularly from season two onward. Season five is midway through and … UGH. I’m teetering on the edge of just quitting the show, I can’t stand ANYONE anymore.

Wow I can’t believe I wasted my time reading this blog your all a bunch of bitchy ass girls nitpicking little details out of a whole character. Taking elena as a whole character she has still done so many unselfish things continuously but because your choosing to look for the bad things and aren’t really trying to look for good you create this idea in your mind that elena is so much of a worse character than she is I’ve had this conversation about a lot of shows and characters and people all do the same thing. Don’t be so quick to judge when you could make the same decisions a character made if you were in the situation. I hate people sometimes

Elena thinks she owns people. She tries to control them. And when that fails, she becomes sullen and whiny about it. She’s not okay with Stefan dating anyone except her, even though she’s with Damon. Her family, her emotions, and her beliefs come first. She’s an introverted feeler on the MBTI spectrum and since I’m an extroverted feeler, actually, I wouldn’t make the same choices as Elena. She’s a different personality type than I am. I’m more likely to make choices like Elijah does, which is why I like him as well as I do. (Although he has too much faith in people. I’m more of a skeptic.)

The only good thing elena had done was she killed by rebekah on the bridge and that show should’ve ended that season. She even made damon to get his humanity while damon was a vampire and she made Bonnie’s Grams dead just to save the salvators. Don’t forget about how long she spent summer having sex with damon and never noticed that Bonnie had already dead because of bringing her brother back to life. She always think about herself and keep blaming others when her family were in danger. She even killed Kol and tried to kill rebekah and killed Finn and tons of human life to selfish reason. So tell me where is the good thing she ever done? Even john gilbert, her biological father suicide his life to bring her back from death and she was just whinning about Jenna’s death. Never care about john gilbert who tried so hard to keep her alive.

I agree, Elena sucks and needs to get completely heart broken. Sleeping with Damon like that is horrible, especially after all the crap he has done to her best friend Caroline during season one. I started hating her too after the 1st couple of seasons, and now it’s full blown hatred. I hate her whining/crying ass. I still like Stephan a lot, wish he gets a better girl that he falls deeply in love with, and I hope the girl is someone that Elena is/becomes extremely jeolous of. I hope Matt falls deeply in love with Rebecca too, becomes a vampire to be with her always, cause he’s been stuck on Elena since the beginning too. Lastly, I hope Damon breaks up with Elena permanently and admits that he just wanted his brother all to himself (or some other lame excuse) and that she never did it for him. In actuality he still cares for Katherine, and that’s the only reason why he was even slightly interested in Elena. Pretty much, just completely screw Elena. That’s the way the show should end. Elena’s a damn selfish slut and deserves it.

I completely agree about Elena! She is so selfish parading around as if she is caring. She’s scandalous for hopping from brother to brother and having the nerve to get upset with Stefan for sleeping with Katherine?! Like who does her character think she is?! Not only is she foul for sleeping with her ex’s brother but after what Damon did to her friend… Excuse me bestfriend?? Yea sure she wasn’t that great of a friend before she became a Vampire but if Damon can act like that toward her then how can Elena even date him? I love Stefan though because he’s real and he is so patient and selfless for not hating Elena. I also love Elijah, Klaus, and Rebecca despite there character’s flaws they have a noble aspect to them!

Elena thinks she owns Stefan and Damon, so them sleeping with anyone else is a big “no no.” SHE can sleep with one or other of them if she likes, but they are not allowed to move on or cease loving her. *grumble grumble complain*

I love Elijah and tolerate Rebecca, but I despise Klaus. He’s a manipulative, abusive man who pretty fits all the warnings for a psychopath (repeated abuses, followed by routine blaming of his bad behavior on those he abused, by claiming if they wouldn’t make him upset, they wouldn’t get hurt). Ugh.

I remember when Elena knew Damon was slept with rebekah and she seemed so upset, forgot about the fact that her boyfriend was stefan and she just dumped damon. For God sake I wanna punch her until she never exist again

I completely agree. It pisses me off that Elena is ALWAYS highlighted as the most caring, selfless person in the show, when in reality almost everything she does is insanely selfish. I hate when people are given reputations they don’t deserve. I like Katherine because she doesn’t try to act all high and mighty and pretend she’s something she’s not. And I COMPLETELY agree with the Elijah thing. He really is a great character. He does not get enough screen time at all.

However, unlike Elena, he didn’t start off like that. In fact, in his flashbacks, he seems entirely different. He’s kinder, more empathetic (his scene with Rebekah during the thunderstorm, where he comforted her and acted as an emotional rock for her seems indicative of this) , more protective of his siblings yet also is clearly terrified of Mikael (a number of scenes show this, both as a boy when Mikael beats him for failing to bring down a deer, and when as a young man Mikael almost kills him for having a bit of fun with Elijah), while simultaneously craving his approval (ratting out Rebekah for stealing his weapons, for example).

See, the thing you have to understand with Klaus is, that people don’t like his character because he’s a good person, or even disagree that he’s a horrible person, for the most part. Rather, they appreciate how the character got from where he was, to the monster he became. When looked at in perspective there’s a clear development, you can see how he changed and why. And some people (less cynical than I) take Elijah’s view, and believe that the definition of broken means that something can be fixed. They want to believe that he can be saved, just like Original Brother Number One does, which further broadens the fan base. He’s interesting, even IF he is a psychopathic, narcissistic, paranoid, with abandonment issues.

Elena, on the other hand, when looked at in perspective, starts off bad, and gets worse. So, if you want to like Elena, it’s necessary to only watch the first two/maybe three seasons, so you can shrug off the moments that could only be explained by selfish motivations. Which, in case Julie Plec is wondering, is NOT THE WAY YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO WRITE A HEROINE.

I absolutely can see how Klaus became the way he did, but I don’t allow that to excuse his violent, abusive behavior. It’s like the writers looked up “abusive boyfriend” and wrote Klaus. Controlling. Violent when people disagree with him. Childish. Immature. Yes, he craves family and love, but the horrible thing about Klaus is… he could have that love and family if he wasn’t so hell-bent on controlling all of them.

Poor Elijah. Typical ISFJ. Never give up on family. But Klaus cannot be fixed, unless he wants to change and… I don’t think he wants to change.

Elena starts out deceptively sweet but still controlling, but the last couple of seasons she has been such a jerk that I can’t even look at the old Elena without hating her guts. She reminds me of Lana from Smallville A LOT. I loved Lana for several seasons, but the writing turned her into a bitch and now I can’t stand her even when she’s nice. 😛

thank goodness. people who understand. i’m rewatching tvd on my computer at the moment an i’m so frustrated with elena. I don’t remember when I started to hate elena. I think late season 3 early season 4. people say she’s nice and caring but she’s an annoying little twat. she’s just like Katherine. the only difference is Katherine doesn’t try and act like a perfect innocent angel. Katherine is one of my favs. anywho. elena. expects everyone to do things her way and when they don’t she cracks the shits. she’s so judgemental. she judges Jeremy with the whole Anna ghost thing but if it happened to her she’s make bonnie find a way to make things work no matter the consequences. . she judges Stefan for choosing to feed instead of dying during his transition, later on she ends up drinking blood. she judges Caroline for wanting her [Elena] to blow out the birthday candles and move on with her life. Elena ends up telling Caroline on her birthday/funeral to move on with her life and get over being a vampire. she judges Rebekah for hurting her family. even though Elena actually killed her brother, Kol and stabbed her in the back and daggered Elijah. she judges everyone but she does the same thing or even worse. she thinks she’s so moral and is always right. like that time she thought it was right to make Jeremy leave mystic falls and forget Vicki. I understand her intentions. I actually think that it was one of the less selfish things she’s done but she had no right taking his choices away from him. she’s a bloody Mary sue and doesn’t take Stefan of Damon’s feelings into consideration. I hope they both get sick of her and she ends up with neither.
I never actually thought about the part where she kills an original, breaking some poor girls heart. it was so peed off about that btw. Kol was my favourite character. it literally took me weeks to overcome it. any who, that was a really good point. she’s so manipulative and is a bad person full stop. I just can’t stand her. it’s also annoying how everyone keeps trying to save her and how everyone gets hurt because of her.
sorry I didn’t mean to write a whole thing on her it’s just once I get started I can’t stop. hate isn’t even close to a good enough word describing how I feel about her. egh!! her self-righteous attitude infuriates me so much. sorry. I’m just going to shut up now.

I like Katherine — because she is up front about being a total bitch! Elena is passive-aggressive in her bitchiness and as you pointed out, one of the most judgmental people on the planet — who turns around and accuses Caroline of being judgmental. Excuse me?! Hypocrite!

Kol was fabulous. He was entertaining and fun and I miss him.

Not even sure I’m going to finish watching this season when it returns. I’m so over it.

Okay. If you didn’t know, almost every show has “character development.” Just because a character changes doesn’t mean you have go all condescending. In the books, Elena is changed into a vampire and she becomes human again. All of the facts you posted above did happen in the books-meaning her attitude and selfishness, not the true scenes. She still had a good heart and she was transformed into an angel. In the books, Angels are good, hearted creatures who serve their lord. Or, have you not read the books? I respect your opinion, and by damn, I hope you respect my mine.

Yes, I’m aware shows should have character development. Damon has had great character development — he’s improved as a person and as a character. Alas, I used to like Elena and now I can’t stand the sight of her. And that’s my right, as a viewer.

Life is full of easy ways to avoid things that upset you. If you happen to adore Elena and see a post that says why someone else hates her — avoiding that post is the perfect way to avoid getting upset for no reason. Life is too short to be mad at people you disagree with.

I was glad to run across this blog….I am getting really annoyed with Elena and the show. I realize that they can’t keep couples happy for long, but the show hasn’t given us any great Damon/Elena moments after some of us waited forever for them to be together. The way Elena is treating Damon is shameful…..it’s ALL about Stefan, yet she expects Damon to just sit back and take it. And the way she’s hanging around and flirting with this new guy at college is irritating too. perhaps Damon needs to flirt and obsess over other women and see how she likes it. and Caroline needs to lay off Elena about Damon, because STEFAN was NO ANGEL either!!!!!

The last couple of seasons have really been disappointing — the doppleganger thing, the sire bond, and now the whole “destiny” element of Stefan and Elena is just… ugh. It used to be one of my favorite shows, and now I only halfheartedly watch it.

Of course Stefan was no angel but Caroline was abused and manipulated by Damon. You can’t really argue with her anger no one gets over being abused it’s hard enough that he still has to be in her life but someone she cared about (jesse) was sacrificed to save the guy she hates.I’d be mad and hurt she’s watching out for her friend cause he wasn’t good to her when they were together.

Definitely agree with you. At first I couldn’t stand Caroline, but she became one of my favourite, and Elijah, well… <3. I feel sorry for Bonnie too : she's doing all the hard work, looses pretty much everyone she cares for, but Elena gets to say "I can't stand to loose another person" ? come on !
Also, I'm very irritated when a character, like Stefan, says "I promess, everything's gonna be all right" : do not make promises you're not sure to keep. And indeed, things get worse and worse… but I still like this show nonetheless !

I always did like Caroline, but have come to like her even more as the obvious differences between her and Elena have become apparent. Caroline seeks to do things for OTHER people, whereas for Elena, it’s all about what SHE wants, all the time.

Poor Bonnie has been mistreated from the start; she gives and gives and gets nothing in return. 😦

I’m an addict; I keep watching this show even when it abuses me, but at some point it’ll go to far and I’ll quit. But hey, at least “The Originals” is good so far.

ikr, and both brothers risk their lives just to save her life all the fricken time!!!! -.-‘ And it is all elena’s fault that Alaric, Jenna, And Vicki are dead, and bonnie’s mom is a vampire. She says she wants to protect the one she loves but she doesn’t, instead she hurts them and sometimes ends ups killing them. And first she’s with Stefan then breaks up then back to him and now she kisses Damon and then is with Damon and sleeps with him, like WTF MAN!!!!???? T-T Then now she says she’s in love with Damon, ooooh… this is going way too far. I’ll just stop talking before i say any more shitty things about her, oh, and why doesn’t other people see how bad and awful she is.
-Thank You for reading is you did. 🙂
-Joanna

Well… technically, it’s Klaus’ fault that Jenna is dead. Alaric is on Klaus’ mother. Vicki is Damon’s fault. But yes, Elena is a hypocrite who wavers back and forth between the brothers, unfairly playing them off one another, and thinking only of her small inner circle.

If people wanted to be technical about it, it’s all Quetsiyah/Silas’s (Quetilas? Quetsilas? Silah? Whatever) fault that all those people died. They caused the doppelganger’s to be created, which Esther then used in her jacked up version of the immortality spell, which however many years later resulted in Isobel/Elena……it goes on. So, TECHNICALLY, every person who has ever died in that grouping of people can be blamed on them. Except for Vicki. Vicki was just because Damon enjoys being a dick. Unless you want to bring up the Katherine is a doppelganger thing and tie it back to Siliyah……bah. It’s too hard following that train of thought.

I’ve been wondering if I should watch The Vampire Diaries. I watched the pilot episode a few years ago and was very unimpressed but pretty much everyone says that the show picked up halfway through S1. Would you say that the audience is SUPPOSED to dislike Elena now? I can deal with unlikeable characters in fiction but what really drives me up the wall is when characters are unlikeable and yet the writers still want you to sympathise with them.

Yeah, the show took awhile to get really good — maybe midway through the first season? Season two was fantastic, season three was okay, season four was a disaster, and so far season five is “meh.” You might want to consider the spin-off, “The Originals,” instead — it actually does have likable characters.

I think the writers love Elena and intend the audience to love her too, but… she’s so selfish I can’t. I much prefer Caroline.

You prefer Caroline the hypocrite, the control freak, the Stefan worshiper? Interesting!
Caroline never was a true friend to Elena!
Jesse died because of Stefan going all ripper on him and Caroline had to feed him her blood to save his life. Wes killed him to get a vampire to experiment on. Elena had to stake him to save Damon!
Would you let a vampire ripper kill your boyfriend just because Caroline wants you to?
Jesse died on Caroline’s watch so she’s feeling guilty about his death. If Elena did not stake Jesse somebody else would have! And by the way: Jesse started feeding on Caroline so Jesse would have killed her eventually and good riddance.
Damon saved Caroline’s ass many times after he mistreated her in season one so they are quit.

And Caroline has no right or business judging Elena’s relationship with Damon because guess what Stefan is a full blown ripper, a time bomb ticking away and always ready to go off. Why didn’t hypocrite Caroline blame Stefan for Jesse’s death? hmmm I didn’t think so so give me a break with all the hypocrisy!

Elena had to kill Kol for self defense. He attacked her and her brother and he won’t quit trying to off them both so they killed him. And why is Kol the great person now? Interesting accusations against Elena! Why don’t you check all facts before harping about how selfish Elena is?
How selfish was Stefan in turning Jeremy into a hunter just so he can fix his former broken toy and get back the human Elena? Why don’t you point that out?
So please if you are going to judge here use the same standards for everybody, will you! Geez!

Caroline was never a true friend to Elena? Oh, okay. I guess Caroline forgiving Elena for trying to kill her multiple times wasn’t friendship then. Yes, Caroline is a little controlling and judgmental; she’s an ESFJ. They just roll that way. But that is, in part, because they’re trying to protect everyone in their life from being hurt. They care about EVERYONE, not just their little inner circle of friends.

Would you let a vampire ripper kill your boyfriend just because Caroline wants you to?

No. I’d snap his neck, render him unconscious, and then put him somewhere safe until they figured out how to wean him off his lust for vampire blood. Because, clearly, there is a cure — Damon is now a vampire ripper, and the writers sure as hell won’t kill off Damon, so there WILL BE A SOLUTION somewhere.

You’re right — letting someone save your life makes up for him compelling you into being a human bloodbag, and feeding on you during sex. My bad.

Sadly, the writers have turned Caroline into a hypocrite of late. I’m not talking about Stefan, either. Stefan is the person who helped Caroline through her transition. She saw the best part of him, not the worst. But she slept with Klaus — who is by far the most abusive, murderous, cold-hearted asshole on the face of the earth, whose list of evil deeds far outweighs Damon’s actions. If she continues to complain about Elena’s relationship with Damon after that — yeah, she’s a full-blown hypocrite.

Still pondering why Elena didn’t call Elijah about the Kol problem. Even Klaus was going to stop him. Kol was a loose cannon, it’s true, but I never defended his actions — I called out Elena on doing something that, if someone else did it to her, she would pitch a hissy fit over. Elena only ever thinks about a) herself, and b) a small immediate circle of friends. She never deals with the fall-out, she never looks beyond her limited range of vision, and she never considers how her actions will negatively impact innocent parties.

You want brutal honesty? Everyone on this show is selfish; I pointed out Elena, because she’s by far the most selfish main character I’ve ever seen. Selfishness in secondary characters is expected, but we’re supposed to LIKE Elena — and I don’t, not anymore. Where the hell is Buffy when you need her? THAT was a heroine.

But just for kicks:
Elena – well covered
Stefan – controlling personality with a martyr complex
Damon – intentional psychopath who kills people whenever he’s pissed off
Bonnie — a selfish brat who treats her friends like crap whenever they have a disagreement about anything
Caroline — an insecure, neurotic, control freak
Matt — boring as hell, a bit preachy
Tyler — an attempted rapist
Jeremy — a whiny, pathetic, suicidal non-entity

The Originals:
Kol – a psychopath, but the most honest and sincere one of the bunch (at least he’s not bipolar)
Klaus – an abusive, controlling, insecure psychopath with bipolar tendencies
Elijah – a hypocrite (it’s all about family — except for Kol)
Rebekah – a backstabbing, insecure brat

Bonnie is the least selfish character on the show.
Jeremy is not whiny or pathetic, and considering what kind of life he has (2nd worst on the show after Bonnie)he has plenty of reason to be suicidal.All things considered I am surprised how well Jeremy has been doing emotionally since the suicide/failed attempt to turn into a vampire thing.

Was her journey from selfish to completely narcissistic a natural one, or was it just out of the blue (I know you’ve mentioned that some characters just changed for no reason other than to further the writers’ ideas). I hate when the character you’ve liked all along changes like that.

I honestly don’t know. I think it could be that when she became a vampire, she got more selfish — because that was the season where I really started disliking her. So yes, she changed abruptly with the excuse that the vamprism did it? I don’t know, I’ve given up looking for logic on this show. LOL

New layout: I like it too, but I’m not sure about the font size. Alas, that’s not something I can change in the coding. Oh, well. I’ll leave it for awhile.

But if you’ve said there are some “good” vampires, that’s a pretty flimsy excuse to have her become so loathsome. It really does sound like an intriguing show, but I don’t need another show to suck me in!

Do you think the size is too big or small? I have no problems reading it.

There are good vampires — Elijah, for example. So yeah, either way — Elena has gone through an identity crisis and never recovered from it. =P

It’s an addictive show but I won’t encourage you to get hooked on it. Heh.

Small. It looks bigger on my work computer than it does on my home computer — but I have a really high resolution at home, so that may make it look smaller for me. (Good to know it’s an okay font size for other people!)